Dovah-fly and the Flame
by Bottled green
Summary: Set in Elder Scrolls Online, May contain spoilers regarding the main questline and Clockwork City DLC. The most mysterious of the Dunmer living gods and a hero haunted by her past; in the midst of staving off daedric plots and trying to remain true to oneself - can there be something more?
1. Chapter 1

_**A/N:** I know I shouldn't start a new story. I should finish the other two stories first, but... it's not exactly new. I guess I'm weak ;) The text in Italic comes directly from the game and I take no credit for it, just as I don;t take credit for the amazing world and characters of The Elder Scrolls Series._

* * *

 **Reluctant God**

The inky blue depth of the skies above, littered with stars, made it easy to forget that one was standing in the midst of an artificial world brought to life by the will of one being; the gears and cogs slowly moving above only adding to the dreamlike feel of the landscape. Now that the realm was out of immediate danger, the vestige listened in to the brief conversation between Sotha Sil and Divayth Fyr, unsurprised by the task appointed to the mage: hiding away the Skeleton Key to prevent Nocturnal from endangering the Throne Aligned yet again.

Efficient as always, the wizard made short work of their farewell.

"Goodbye, assistant. I was correct in choosing you."

As soon as he said that, Fyr disappeared, leaving the vestige alone with the third dunmer living god she'd met in the span of one year. He turned towards her and for a moment, she felt small and quite insignificant. She didn't notice it the first, brief time they spoke; the lord of the Clockwork City was perhaps the tallest person she'd ever seen - being a citizen of the Empire, she was used to seeing races other than human, but none she'd met towered above her like he did, not even the Altmer.

She observed him keenly, for the first time being able to truly do so out of the ever-present dimness of the Basilica; at first glance, except for his unusual height, Sotha Sil looked more similar to the Dunmer she'd met travelling through the Pact lands than to his fellow Tribunes. While Almalexia chose to appear as a Chimer and Vivec preferred his dual skin colour, Sotha Sil apparently didn't mind the ashen skin and red eyes bestowed upon the dunmer by Azura's curse. As most of the dark elves she'd seen, he had sharp features and slender build. Long, white hair flowed freely from under a crown-like, three-pronged helmet that covered most of the left side of his face and his nose. That's where the similarities ended; Sotha Sil wore a simple, white robe that did nothing to hide the metallic, robotic limb where his left arm used to be; his right hand had also been replaced. At first the vestige thought Sotha Sil was floating above ground like the other living gods liked to and that is why he seemed so impossibly tall, but she quickly noticed that not only was he standing firmly on the ground, he was barefoot.

She felt ashamed all of a sudden, realizing how long she'd been staring at him and hesitantly met his gaze, but his red, slanted eyes watched her with what seemed an endless patience. Sotha Sil looked and felt different from the other living gods of the dark elves; while the other two emitted constant light and exuded power and pride, he seemed almost muted in comparison, silent and calm. For a reason yet unexplained, the vestige found it reassuring, but quickly forgot that thought and winced. She had to crane her neck to look up at him, and it was starting to feel more and more uncomfortable. She had no time to react when she felt her body being lifted off the ground by an unseen force and found herself face to face with the Clockwork god.

"Ask." He said as if nothing happened, and as if he was privy to her thoughts. "I will answer truthfully."

"Who are you really?" she asked immediately, without thinking.

"Are you expecting something grand?" Sotha Sil replied, his head tilting to the side slightly. " _But I promised you the truth. I am only what time and circumstance made me. Son of a lost house. Friend to a fallen king. Some will tell you that we are the product of our choices. I've never found that to be the case_."

"But you're supposed to be a god, right?"

One of the mechanical hands whirred quietly when raised as though to emphasize a point. Sotha Sil's voice was another quality that distinguished him from a regular Dunmer for its reverberating, metallic echo. It almost sounded as if two mer were speaking at once – the flesh and blood one at the forefront, and the artificial one in the background.

" _I am whatever the people need me to be. A guardian. An oppressor. For some, too distant. For others, too meddlesome. I am the canvas upon which they paint their dreams and resentments. A vessel for their hopes and doubts. A mirror, nothing more._ "

His words resonated with the vestige more than she expected them to. It was an uncommon emotion, to feel she could relate to another this way, to one whose life extended through centuries and would continue long after her bones turned to dust, but that's what she felt – a sudden sense of kinship. She also was a product of circumstance, someone who miraculously survived losing a soul, one whose house was now nothing but a painful memory, one pinned under the weight of expectations or resentment due to her role in the soulburst crisis.

"Then why do you call yourself a god?" she curiously asked, briefly wondering how her words would be considered a heresy amongst the Dunmer of Tamriel.

" _I don't._ " replied Sotha Sil with a shake of his head. " _But my companions, Vivec and Almalexia see their divinity as essential. Godhood brings them joy and purpose. They find meaning in the theatrical. Who am I to deprive them of that?_ "

The vestige stared at him for a long moment, surprised by his honesty, but then smiled.

"You are right about the theatrics."

"You've met both of them; not many can say that." Observed Sotha Sil. "I understand Vivec named you his champion."

"Yes." Sighed the vestige. "In front of the entire city. I never asked nor would I have chosen that, but then again, who am I to deprive him of the joy of being overly dramatic?"

For a fleeting moment, she could swear she could see a faint smile on the Clockwork God's lips. She asked more questions about the other two tribunes, still amazed by the immediate and honest answers, wondering how many people before her had had an opportunity to talk to him like that and how many would want to, her thoughts immediately on provost Varuni Arvel. The woman was extremely devoted to the one she called her god; despite never being able to talk to him throughout her century of faithful service, at times the way she spoke about Sotha Sil reminded the vestige of how one speaks of their lover. Her whole life revolved around the one she worshipped, a feat that the more down-to-earth vestige considered both impressive and unhealthy.

With a start she realized that yet again she drifted off into her own thoughts, leaving the Clockwork God to stand in front of her in silence for what must have been minutes. Not only that; she had been too straightforward in her greedy curiosity and did not show him enough respect. She felt heat rising in her cheeks, ashamed of her carelessness, but once again, Sotha Sil didn't seem like it bothered him.

"You're back." He observed curiously. "What boon would you have me grant you for what you did for me and those depending on me?"

"I thought that boon was already granted." Replied the vestige in surprise. "I asked you to heal Luciana, and you did."

"That was something you asked for thinking of Luciana…" he paused, "and me. I wish to give you something you want for yourself."

"I can't think of anything like that. It is not necessary."

Once again, a ghost of a smile graced the god's lips.

"Be sure to tell me when you finally decide what it is." He said, as he slowly lowered the vestige on the ground. "You are too altruistic for your own good."

"If you say so, my lord." Replied the vestige, bowing her head, glad she was finally able to show respect and again regretting not doing it earlier.

"You don't have to address me as such. Titles are meaningless."

"No, my lord. It is necessary." The vestige looked up, her eyes full of conviction. "For you these may be theatrics as you like to call them, but I was raised at the Imperial Court. You may not be a god, and certainly not one I worship, but you are the ruler of this realm, your station is higher than mine, and I will give respect when it is due."

"Very well, if being formal is what matters to you… Astia Varo."

The vestige bit her lip, trying not to smile. She did not expect a being with god-like powers to have a sense of humour; it was amusing that in order to subtly chastise her for insisting on using the title he cared nothing for, Sotha Sil fired back by using both her name and the name of her house. Still, her smile disappeared quickly.

"My lord…" she started hesitantly. "Is it possible for me to leave the Clockwork City?"

"It is, when I allow it. For now, I cannot."

Astia's head shot up and she could do nothing to hide her surprise and a hint of anger.

"Why would you not let me leave? I need to…"

"Peace, Astia Varo." A decisive move of a metallic hand interrupted her. The full name was used again as if it always had been, and the vestige suspected it would be for the foreseeable future.

"I know you have a war to win." The dual voice was lower now, almost gentle. "I know that although you have prevented a great calamity and subdued Molag Bal, your homeland still needs salvation. I know. Alas, the lady of shadows still lurks at our doorstep and you… I feel you still have a greater role to play. I told you before; you may yet be the one to save us all; and as such, I will not risk your life. When it is safe to leave, I will help you do just that."

"But Divayth Fyr…" she tried still, knowing it was futile.

"You survived removing soul from your body and thwarted not one, but three Daedric princes… The threads of your fate are bizarre, and special, making you succeed where ones stronger than you would fail. Still, you're no Divayth Fyr. Not yet. Do not take unnecessary risks."

Astia's head hung low as she quietly accepted.

"Yes, my lord."

A sudden touch made her head snap up. The Clockwork God was leaning down towards her, the automaton limb heavier on her shoulder than a comforting touch should feel.

"You will return home, Astia Varo." He said, "Though what you find there might make you wish you didn't. For now, rest. You deserve it. We will speak again, soon."

Then he disappeared, leaving Astia alone in the garden created of what she suspected was loneliness and regret. She walked slowly among the plaques and images they invoked, struck especially by two.

 _Sotha Nall. A soul that deserved transcendence. May her voice forever be heard in all the cogs and gears._

Astia understood quite quickly, or at least she thought she did. She remembered a book about factotums and how the author theorised their female voice was modelled after Sotha Sil's sister. So that's who the woman from the garden was; Sotha Nall, sister of Sotha Sil. She must've been important enough for him to be immortalised throughout his creation. Immediately, Astia felt pain, almost physical, as the thought of her brother surfaced from where she had been trying to bury it. Her brother. A proud centurion of the army, stationed at the Imperial City when the skies were torn asunder, brother she'd never heard from since. Brother that was most likely dead.

Wiping tears from her face, Astia turned to re-read the other plaque that caught her attention.

 _Nerevar the Captain. May we forever have his wisdom. And his forgiveness._

His forgiveness. She couldn't help but wonder what was it that Sotha Sil felt so sorry for. Were the Ashlanders right? Did he, Vivec and Almalexia indeed kill Nerevar to ascend to godhood? She shook her head. What happened centuries before she was even born was of no concern to her. Not now. She could only hope that the threat of Nocturnal breaching the city again would be quickly diminished so she could return to Tamriel and go where she desperately needed to – to Cyrodiil. Even though Molag Bal had fallen, her homeland still burned, torn between the three Alliances and the remaining daedra. It pained Astia to think that the once mighty and proud Empire would likely fall prey to other nations. She knew she couldn't save her country on her own, not even being the vestige, the Soulless One who regained her soul, faced a daedric prince and lived to tell the tale. She needed the backing of one of the Alliances and logic demanded it to be the Ebonheart Pact, where she gained friends and considerable influence for the past year.

It hadn't been an easy journey. All of the Pact races were distrustful of Imperials, so Astia's lineage had done her no favours. She had to earn their trust, and it cost a considerable amount of blood. She remembered the first one who trusted her and once again, couldn't stop tears. Was it this place that made her react this way? Had Sotha Sil's grief been imprinted on the garden as he was creating it? Whatever it was, Astia remembered the Dunmer general with long, red hair, always carefully braided, a flaming staff on his back, at first haughty and insufferably proud in her eyes, then a trusted friend, ally and… No. She wouldn't go there.

'You should have told him how you felt', whispered a tiny, traitorous voice in Astia's head. 'Now you never will. He will never know. And you will never know what could have been.'

"Silence." Whispered the vestige. An imperial noble and a grandmaster of one of the five dunmeri great houses? It would never have worked out, she thought, just as she had many times before, a thought that made her stay silent. It would never have been allowed, even if he had felt the same way. Never. It was better it forever stayed buried.

'You've never given it a chance.'

"No." admitted the vestige quietly. "I never have. But it doesn't matter any longer."

She walked the path out of the elegiac garden, her heart heavy with regret and sadness for a budding feeling she never let flourish and for a mer that broke down under a heavy loss and fell, farther than she could reach him. At least now Tanval Indoril, grandmaster of his house, was with the son he so missed in the afterlife, while Astia Varo, an Imperial too far from home, was still fighting, deprived of his friendship and support.

"He is gone, isn't he?"

The sudden question stopped Astia in her tracks and as she looked at provost Arvel, it took her a while to calm down and understand it wasn't Tanval that Varuni was talking about.

"Varuni." The vestige regained her composure quickly. "Yes, lord Sil is gone."

The provost's dark, beautiful face immediately got a resigned, disappointed look.

"I thought I could finally talk to him."

"You will, Varuni. I am sure of that."

"You don't understand…" the elf shook her head. "I have served him for over a century. I have practiced many times, in front of a mirror… what I'd say when I finally see him. Now I have only questions."

Astia couldn't shake an uneasy feeling Varuni's words caused. It was a thin line between devotion and obsession, and it seemed as though the provost was dangerously close to crossing it. It worried her as she had grown to like her. It had been Varuni's sponsorship that allowed Astia, Neramo and the Vanos siblings to become citizens of the Clockwork City and they had spent many evenings together, enjoying each other's company, as the provost felt at ease with those who were younger than the rest of the upper echelons of the Brass Fortress' hierarchy.

"Is there anything you'd like me to ask him for you?" offered Astia, hoping to ease some of her friend's disappointment.

Varuni's eyes widened.

"Will you see him again?"

The vestige nodded.

"I think so. Before he left, lord Sil said we'd speak again, soon."

"Will you be leaving us soon, then?" asked Varuni.

"Not yet." The vestige shook her head. "Lord Sil believes it is still too dangerous with Nocturnal at the City's doorstep."

"Do you plan on staying indefinitely?" there was a strange sharpness to Varuni's voice that Astia didn't like.

"Gods, no, Varuni!" she replied quickly. "I have a country to fight for, even if my home…" her voice trailed away at her own words.

She felt Varuni's hands squeezing her arms, and when she lifted her head to look at her friend, she saw genuine look of concern on the elf's face.

"You will return home, Astia, do not doubt it. There is nothing Lord Seht cannot do.

"Now, hurry back to the fortress. We all need rest… I'll stay here for a while, but I'll join you soon."


	2. Chapter 2

**Apple Wine**

"I'm back." Astia sighed heavily as she shook her boots off and entered the house.

"Welcome back!" Neramo poked his head out of his laboratory where he was no doubt tinkering with some strange machinery Astia would not stand a chance understanding.

"Kireth and Raynor?" she asked, sitting down at the table.

"Out in the Radius, but they should be back soon." The high elf mage joined her with two glasses of wine in what was their practiced evening routine.

Astia took a sip and closed her eyes, delighted. The wine was made of apples, the only fruit growing in the Everwound Wellspring, and wasn't as good as the heavy, dry imperial wines she liked, but she still enjoyed it.

"So… what is he like?" Neramo's voice was brimming with curiosity.

"Sotha Sil?" Astia opened her eyes and pondered for a while before she replied. "He's… I'm not sure. He's calm. Boundless. Deep. Extremely tall. Uses too many words. Has a sense of humour."

Neramo chuckled.

"Such blasphemous words, my dear."

Astia shrugged.

"He is not my god."

"Nor is he mine." Agreed the mage, "But your description makes me even more curious. Is he as extensively modified as the rumours have it?"

Another shrug.

"Both his arms, for sure. Probably part of his face, the one covered by a rather ugly helmet. Not his legs, I think. The rest I have no idea about."

"Pity." Said Neramo. "I'm really curious."

Astia chuckled.

"Curiosity killed the skeever." She replied, "And such blasphemous words, my dear."

They both laughed at that, and then sipped their wine in silence. Astia stretched her legs under the table, feeling the tension leave her body. The friendly banter with Neramo helped her forget the uneasy mood that settled upon her in the elegiac garden. She looked around and once again was surprised how homely this place felt. Tired of staying at the inn and exhausted by the Auditory Stimulator's attempts to play "Red Diamond", Astia asked Razgurug for advice a while ago. The orcish mayor of Slagtown knew everything there was to know about the Brass Fortress and helped her find a small home that remained empty after the previous owner had passed away of old age. As long as nobody claimed it, it was fine for her to stay. Astia immediately offered her friends to live with her.

She had known Raynor and Kireth Vanos from before she ventured into the Clockwork City with Divayth Fyr; she'd explored several Dwemer ruins with them across the Pact lands and quickly grew to like the hotheaded sister and calm, overthinking brother. She was pleasantly surprised to find the inquisitive siblings at the gates of Sotha Sil's city. Neramo was a more recent addition; she'd only met him once in Vvardenfell and was too busy to bond, helping him rescue his excavation crew from an automaton-infested dwarven ruin. Now she was glad he was around with his experience, wit and cynical sense of humor. Astia missed her parents and brother and thought that probably that longing was at the foundation of her new, bizarre family consisting of her - a lonely Imperial with no court to flaunt her nobility, two Dunmer too curious for their own good and a pragmatic, haughty Altmer mage.

"You saved him. Him and the city, myself included." Neramo's voice pulled her back in.

"Thank you, Astia." The look on the mage's face was surprisingly serious.

"And thank you." She replied.

"For what?"

"If not for your lamp, we wouldn't even have known what was wrong.

"Raynor helped you." She continued, "Without Varuni, we wouldn't even be in the city. Without Kireth, Raynor and you, Varuni wouldn't have sponsored us. Divayth crossed the Evergloam alone and kept Sotha Sil alive as I fought the shadow. Luciana held off a daedric prince, on her own, and bought me enough time to save Sotha Sil. There are many to thank. We were all pieces of a puzzle."

"Perhaps. But I still think you were the most important one." Neramo leaned towards Astia and suddenly winked. "You better capitalize on that."

"Oh, Neramo." Astia shook her head. "Ever the pragmatist. And an opportunist, but I still like you."

"No wonder. I'm simply irresistible."

Astia chuckled.

"That you are."

"Actually," she added, "Lord Sil asked me what he could give me, personally."

"What did you ask for?"

"Nothing." Replied Astia earnestly. "I can't think of anything."

Neramo shook his head disapprovingly.

"Silly human." He chastised her, but almost immediately smiled. "I'll make you a list."


	3. Chapter 3

_**A/N:** I'd like to thank Maid of Win, TheIsolatedShadow and Nephariel for the first favourites and follows for this story and Wandering Reader for the first review - it means a lot! Here's a new chapter._

* * *

 **Tiredness**

As her hands moved over the whetstone with practiced ease, Astia found the activity of sharpening her sword safe and familiar. Back and forth, back and forth, like a well-known, unhurried dance, slow, uniform strokes so ingrained into her by now that the sword felt a part of her.

She lifted the weapon, inspecting it carefully, then smiled and hummed appreciatively as the perfectly sharpened and polished blade stared back at her with her own reflection. Astia was a bit pale for an Imperial, her complexion resembling a healthy, golden tan; her hair, now tied in a ponytail, was thick and vibrant red, its darker shade also present in the full, high arches of her eyebrows – all these traits often made the vestige think there must have been some distant Nordic ancestor in her bloodline, though when she dared to ask her father once, he vehemently denied it. Her eyes, a mix of coppery brown and yellowish hue, light like watercolour, seemed bigger than they were in her face that had already lost its youthful fullness before the soulburst crisis, the now sharper line of her jaw and cheekbones only accentuated further throughout months upon months of almost constant fighting. A slightly upturned nose drew attention to full mouth, the bottom lip now reddened due to Astia's habit of biting it when deep in concentration.

As she kept staring into her reflection in the wide, imperial sword, in her mind's eye her yellowish eyes transformed into more slanted ones, their deep, ruby red a gateway to centuries of wisdom. The vestige sighed and closed her eyes; recently she found herself thinking of the Clockwork God quite often, intrigued and curious, and had to admit she was looking forward to the next conversation he promised. However, she had not seen him since the elegiac garden two weeks before and she huffed in annoyance at how their definitions of "soon" differed.

"It won't be much longer."

Astia opened her eyes at the sound of the voice and looked up at Luciana Pullo. The proctor was smiling, a rare sight on her usually stern face that combined with extensive body modifications terrified many citizens of the Brass Fortress. Not Astia. Proctor Pullo may be stern, and born in another era, but she was still an Imperial, and to vestige she was like a piece of home in a foreign land. They were in Luciana's study, a place Astia enjoyed visiting as often as she could to talk to the older woman, or to just sit together in silence.

"How do you know what I was thinking about?" asked Astia with a helpless shake of her head.

The proctor seemed amused.

"I simply know how it feels." She replied. "He seems infuriating at first, but you'll get used to it."

"I'm not sure I want to. I might lose my patience."

Proctor Pullo's smile disappeared, replaced by a serious expression.

"Don't."

The vestige arched her eyebrows in surprise.

"Don't." Emphasised the proctor, "Give him time."

The vestige stared at the old battlemage, silently waiting for her to elaborate on her peculiar request.

"He needs to speak to others than himself, others than those who would just see him as a god, but not see who he is. He is…" Luciana paused for a second, "I've always thought that among the crowds that worship him as something he never pretended to be, he was profoundly lonely."

"Lonely?" There was disbelief in vestige's voice. "If one as powerful as he is lonely, it must be because he wishes it."

"Yes and no." replied the proctor. "Lord Seht does not trust easily. I suppose he knows that even greatest trust and devotion can be broken."

Astia's eyes widened in understanding.

"It is Nerevar you speak of, isn't it?" she asked, her voice barely above whisper. "You think Lord Sil doesn't trust easily because he broke a promise given to his dearest friend."

"Aye. You are a perceptive one, Astia."

"Do you…" the vestige hesitated, "Do you think what the Ashland tribes believe is true? Do you think Lord Sil and the others…"

"Killed Nerevar?" interrupted Luciana. "That I do not know. But does it matter to you?"

"I am uncertain." Said the vestige slowly, "Though even if he did, I have no right to judge – my victory over Molag Bal came at a heavy price. I know all too well the burden of sacrificing one's friend."

The Proctor sighed.

"Nerevar was being unreasonable." She said. "If power can be wielded to do good, it should be, and this is what Lord Seht has been doing ever since. This is what matters to me. Anything else that had happened is between Lord Seht and Nerevar himself."

"Perhaps." Admitted the vestige with a pensive look on her face before she looked directly at Luciana. "You know him well, and you don't blindly worship him. Why don't you talk to him more often?"

"I treasure Lord Seht." Proctor Pullo didn't hesitate. "I owe him my life. Yet, he refused to save the life of my son. He only said it was within his power, but circumstances made it impossible. I hadn't seen him for years after, as he had remained in Cogitus Centralis, refusing to speak to anyone."

The vestige stared at her, stunned into silence.

"I hated him for a time, until recently, during Nocturnal's invasion, I realised I couldn't, not anymore. I still chose to save him. For the longest time I thought he gave and took without consideration, that he was like his machines, unable to show true kindness. I don't know anymore… I may have been mistaken. It seemed to pain him to deny my request to heal Marius, still… In my heart, I can never completely forgive him.

"This is why I can never be the one to assuage his loneliness." Luciana's gaze was intense as she looked back at the vestige. "You can, I think – he's spoken to you more than to any other in recent years. Still, do not feel obliged. I would want you to help, but I treasure your friendship, and I will be honest: I see you're hiding something. Something dark, likely painful – it takes one to know one, Astia.

"Lord Seht is wise beyond our understanding, kind when he wants or can be, infuriating, yet fascinating. Helping him may be worth it, but it very well may not. With one hand he may offer you respite, and with the other he may take from you – and not seeing the world the way he does and thus not understanding may hurt you. You will need to judge what is best for you, not him."

"Thank you for your honesty, Luciana." Said Astia. "Truth is, I wouldn't mind talking more to Lord Sil, but even though I want to, time is of the essence. I am needed elsewhere."

"Our homeland." Luciana understood immediately, just as expected.

The vestige nodded.

"It still burns, and I fear it may be torn apart between the remnants of daedra and the three alliances."

"Would you rather try to cross over to Tamriel and fall prey to Nocturnal's minions? From what you've told me, you left behind the rightful emperor. They will need to manage until it is safe for you to go back."

The vestige sheathed her sword, satisfied with its sharpness.

"I really hope I have anything to go back to when this time comes, Luciana." She said quietly.

* * *

As she was walking through the basilica on the way back to her temporary home, Astia was surprised by the sound of wings flapping. At first, her hand automatically landed on the hilt of her sword, remembering the last time a bird made its appearance inside – the beginning of Nocturnal's assault at the Brass Fortress, but even quicker she froze in surprise. The bird that flew towards her was not one of the Blackfeather Court – it stopped and hovered unnaturally in one spot in front of her, eliciting gasps from many apostles – it was entirely made of brass. Instinctively, the vestige reached out towards the creature, overcome by curiosity, and it landed on her gloved hand. When it spoke, it almost made her jump.

"Come to the Sacristy if you please, Astia Varo." Said the voice she immediately recognized.

The crow automaton made no move to fly away even when she tried to shake it off, and Astia shook her head helplessly. First the Clockwork God made her wait two weeks, and when he finally found time, it seemed he wouldn't wait even a minute.

"I'll be there, my lord." She replied, feeling rather ridiculous directing her answer to a brass bird in front of a growing crowd of curious apostles and walked towards the Sacristy as fast as her legs could carry her to escape the stares and whispers.

The Sacristy door opened almost soundlessly as soon as she arrived, and Astia stepped inside. The door closed just as fast as it opened, leaving her alone with the Clockwork God. From where she stood, the vestige could see his profile as he was tinkering with some device in his lap.

"I can't send you home yet." He said, foregoing any kind of greeting.

"Why did you want to see me then, my lord?" Asked Astia politely, trying to hide her disappointment at his words. She doubted she managed to do it well. Sotha Sil remained silent and didn't even look her way, seemingly fully immersed in his task, and the vestige barely suppressed a sigh.

"At the very least, I can return your messenger." She said eventually, trying to shake the bird off her hand. It didn't let her, digging its metallic claws in her glove and making her hiss in pain.

"It won't leave." She said angrily.

"Nor should it." Commented the Clockwork God. "I made it for you, after all."

The vestige blinked several times and looked at the artificial crow. It cocked its head, and looked back at her.

"I… thank you, my lord." Managed the vestige. "If I may ask, why would you make me an artificial crow?"

"I needed something to occupy my hands with as I was thinking." He replied.

"Oh." The vestige remembered sharpening her sword. "I suppose I can understand, to a certain extent."

Astia looked at the crow again, and this time smiled - it resembled the Blackfeather Court crows perfectly in everything but the colour - it was coppery golden.

"I didn't know gods had a sense of humor." She remarked playfully.

"Gods probably don't." replied Sotha Sil, and Astia bit her lip, wondering if laughing would be too disrespectful.

"It will be useful to you." He added. "It can act as a messenger, guide through the Clockwork City, and has limited combat functions."

As if in response to the description, the crow jumped up and flapped its wings, and settled on Astia's shoulder.

"Very well." She said. "Can I name him?"

"If you wish."

"Bone." Astia's mouth widened in a sincere smile, remembering the quirky crow companion of the past, the Knight of Marrow.

"It would seem sense of humour is a trait shared by those who are not gods." Said the sorcerer. His artificial fingers moved with speed and precision that would likely be impossible to achieve for living flesh, but Astia was still amazed at the lengths he would go to in order to achieve what he must've perceived as perfection.

"What did I do to deserve Bone?" she asked.

"You still haven't told me what you wanted for yourself." Sotha Sil replied, "So I will simply keep making and gifting you with new trinkets until you do. It helps me think and will create enough pressure on you so you make up your mind. I reckon I will not have to make many before you feel too guilty and finally come up with something. Is my assessment of the situation correct?"

Astia shook her head, halfway between amusement and annoyance. He could be infuriating, just like Luciana said.

"Sending me home would be enough." she said. "Can't you simply accept it that I do not require anything else?"

"No, I cannot. You should learn how to be more selfish, Astia Varo. It would be to your benefit."

Sotha Sil finally looked up from his task, and at this moment, all the vestige could think of was how tired he looked, as if weighed down by years of constant vigilance and duty beyond what he must have imagined when he took up the mantle of the almost-divine. Suddenly, she felt sorry for him.

"Lie down." She said, surprising herself. She spoke without thinking.

He said nothing; just stared back at her with these narrow, red eyes, so similar to Tanval's, yet so different – older, more tired. More resigned.

Astia bit her lip, giving into her nervous habit, but then decided to continue. Any conversation they would have could wait, after all, he'd said she couldn't go back to Tamriel yet, and the vestige already knew arguing with him would be a loss of time.

"You need rest, my lord." She said, trying to sound more decisive than she felt. "How long has it been since you last slept?"

"I can go without sleep for much longer than a regular mortal, Astia Varo. It is fine."

The vestige shook her head.

"No. As you pointed out yourself, my lord, you are not a god."

"Ah." The corners of Sotha Sil's mouth twitched slightly. "Indeed, I am not. But I fear I cannot afford rest. By my calculations, Nocturnal's threat is not yet fully gone."

"Do you trust me?" The vestige felt like she was bordering disrespectful, but once she decided her course of action was just, she would not be easily dissuaded.

"Trying to play on guilt?" the sorcerer's head cocked to one side. "It is a feat that will not be accomplished easily, Astia Varo."

Astia shrugged in response.

"I am merely asking, trying to ascertain a fact."

Sotha Sil nodded.

"Very well." He replied, "I do trust you."

"Then you must know I wouldn't let her catch you off guard." The vestige took several steps towards the Clockwork god. "A few hours is all I ask. And during that time, I will stand guard."

"Here?" he sounded mildly surprised, and Astia almost smiled.

"Yes. Here."

"There is no changing your mind without altering your memories, is there?"

The vestige looked aghast.

"You wouldn't, my lord."

"Hmmm." He hummed in response. "No, Astia Varo. I'd rather not. Our conversations are not entirely uninteresting."

This time the vestige couldn't supress a smile, but it quickly faded as she observed the lord of the Clockwork City. He got up and set whatever he was working on aside, then walked towards the desk and bowed his head; mechanical joints whirred as he raised his arms and took the helmet-like crown off his temples, setting it on the metallic surface. When he turned around to face her again, she could see his face was unaltered, and couldn't understand why he'd choose to hide so much of it underneath brass. He looked younger; more… she wasn't sure how to put it – transparent? Fragile? More tired, yet hauntingly striking, almost ethereal, forever suspended between mortality and divinity, belonging to neither. In this moment, Astia was struck by the understanding that Luciana had been right all along – he was alone, his loneliness spanning through centuries, something her mind struggled to come to terms with.

Ignoring her awed expression, Sotha Sil lay down on the sleep station in the corner of the room. He froze, as if unsure what to do next, as though he'd forgotten the simple act of sleep, and Astia felt a pang of compassion and tenderness she'd never expect to experience in his presence. Before she realised what she was doing, she walked towards the motionless, prone figure and stood next to the brass bed looking down. He looked back at her, long, white hair partially covering his face, much like the helmet before. The vestige didn't know much about him, and didn't know the real him; Varuni's face briefly flashed in her mind, along with her blind devotion, and a thought came unbidden, yet it rang true.

He doesn't need any of it, Varuni, nor does he care for it. You're all wrong.

As if hypnotised, the vestige took of her glove and raised her hand, slowly, as though the movement might startle him, and before she knew it, her fingers touched the dark, gaunt face, brushing the stray locks away. His hair wasn't soft; it was dry, thick and coarse, as if neglected for too long, and the vestige was too far gone in her trance, fingers brushing through the warm, long strands in a soothing manner, her thumb ghosting over a high cheekbone in a distracted caress.

It may have been minutes or hours when she finally looked back at him and spoke, forgetting the title she herself had been so adamant to use.

"How long has it been since anybody touched you?" she wondered aloud, and found the answer herself in the surprising, forlorn look on the sorcerer's face. "Oh by Mara's grace… you don't remember, do you?"

She didn't give herself enough time to process this information, suddenly realising what she had done, that she was past a boundary she was never supposed to cross, and fully realised the extent of disrespect she'd just shown. She stepped back, almost stumbling, and bowed.

"My deepest apologies, my lord." She said quietly. "I didn't mean to disrespect you so."

"It is a sad world where compassion is considered disrespect, Astia Varo." The dual voice was almost as quiet as hers. "You did not disrespect me."

The vestige raised her head, surprised, waiting for clarification.

"You do not make a habit of touching others, nor do you like being touched." Said Sotha Sil calmly, "Yet you've done this, and you're willing to watch over me in my sleep, when it is you who needs it more. You're altruistic to a fault."

Astia's eyes widened as she let his words sink in. He was right, he spoke with such certainty, but more importantly, how did he know? The answer would have to wait. She nodded, and walked towards the wall without a word. She leaned against it, placing her hand on the hilt of her sword. Bone clanked its beak and froze just as his creator did. Astia didn't want to talk anymore, not at this moment and luckily, Sotha Sil seemed to understand; when she looked at him next, his eyes were closed. Whether he was asleep or just pretending, she didn't know.


	4. Chapter 4

**Dreams of pale skies**

Unable to tell day from night inside the Basilica, Astia was gradually losing track of time. She tried thinking of strategies to employ upon her return to Cyrodiil, but ultimately felt too tired by hours dedicated to sharpening her weapon, and then to guarding Sotha Sil in his sleep. At first she felt curious to explore Bone's functions, but didn't want to wake the sorcerer. At present, she didn't know how much time had passed; she leaned heavily against the wall, Sotha Sil's deep, rhythmic breathing the only sound in the room.

She could feel sleep approaching in wave after wave of bone-deep tiredness and although she didn't want to, she knew she'd need sleep, and soon. She feared sleep, just like the sorcerer surmised during their last conversation, but realised she could only resist for so long, jealous of Sotha Sil's ability to go on without sleep for days. She fought tiredness for as long as she was able, but eventually gave up.

"Bone," she whispered. "Wake lord Sil. Please."

The sudden leap from the crow's absolute motionless state from barely a second before to flight only emphasised its artificial nature. To Astia's tired mind, its brief movement through the room seemed unnaturally long, stretched in time as she observed the brass bird fly towards the sleeping Clockwork God. It landed by his side and pulled at the fabric of the sorcerer's tunic in a very human-like manner.

As she saw Sotha Sil stir, the vestige felt both relieved and scared. She didn't notice when her hand let go of her shield, the loud clang it must have made upon hitting the brass floor barely reaching her through the haze of exhaustion. She slid down the wall, aware it was something she shouldn't do, knowing she should reach home.

"Pray your selflessness doesn't spell your doom one day, Astia Varo." she heard as heavy, metallic limbs broke her fall, too tired to determine why his touch didn't terrify her like all others did.

"Who should I pray to?" she said quietly, slurring her words. "You?"

"I'd rather you didn't."

"You don't like it." Mumbled the vestige. She felt being lifted off the ground, but this time by a physical touch, one that still failed to scare her. "You wanted the power to do good, but you never wished to be considered a god."

"Perceptive as ever, Astia Varo." Came an immediate reply.

"They need it though, so you let them revere you as one. Despite your own discomfort." she continued, as Sotha Sil carried her through the chamber. "Who's selfless now?"

She heard a sound close to a quiet chuckle, and tried to smile. Sotha Sil placed her on a firm surface, and the warmth beneath her told Astia it was the same brass bed he'd just used. How peculiar, she managed to think and forced her eyes open to see the dark face above her, still devoid of the helmet-like crown. She raised her hand and touched it again, cupping the sharp jaw. A thought on the fringes of her consciousness whispered she shouldn't, but almost immediately she thought she could feel sorry later. It felt so novel, so good to touch, be touched and not be scared.

"Your eyes are so like his, yet you're so different." she whispered.

"Sleep, Astia Varo." Said the dual voice, its cadence calm and soothing. "He doesn't want you to forego sleep."

"How do you always know what I'm thinking about?" Astia managed to ask before she drifted away. Whatever the answer may be, she wouldn't know.

* * *

The rays of early morning sun warmed Astia's face, filtering from behind a tall, dark spire on a cliff as the waves kept crashing against the shore below. She looked around and smiled, recognising the place.

Ebonheart.

She heard footsteps behind her and turned around, only to freeze in shock. The newcomer stopped a few steps from her, as if he didn't want to scare her. Seconds dripped into minutes before Astia finally found her voice again.

"Tanval."

He only smiled, and nodded, as if he'd always been there, the dark silhouette against the pale skies over Stonefalls, the familiar flaming staff on his back, hair braided in a tight, long braid she was so used to. The vestige wanted to smile, but then her shoulders slumped.

"But you're gone." she said, almost accusingly, the unspoken words hanging between them.

 _You left me all alone._

Tanval Indoril took a step closer to her.

"Indeed, I am." he admitted. "But you are no longer alone, it seems. I am glad."

The vestige tilted her head, not fully understanding his meaning.

"But I am alone." She said sadly. It was but a dream, and it made no sense hiding how she really felt. "How are you in my dream?"

"You have a powerful protector." Replied Tanval and understanding dawned on Astia.

"Lord Sil." She stated matter-of-factly but then frowned. "But this is a dream, isn't it?"

"It is, and yet it isn't." said Tanval somewhat cryptically. "Lord Sil helped us meet once more. I am grateful he did."

"He can do that?" Astia's eyes widened in surprise.

"He is a god, after all." Astia chose not to comment on Tanval's response. He came close and lay a hand on her shoulder and despite herself, the vestige flinched slightly. The Indoril Grandmaster withdrew his hand immediately, though he failed to hide the hurt look on his face.

"I'm sorry." Whispered the vestige. "I didn't mean to."

"I wish we met in another life, one where you wouldn't be scared of my touch. You know I wouldn't hurt you, Astia." he said quietly, and she snapped.

"But you did!" her voice rose, dangerously close to a scream. "You died!"

She hit her fists helplessly against his robe, not noticing when the tears started falling. When he embraced her, her body went rigid for a few seconds, but then relaxed.

"I respected you so much." Astia said through the tears as Tanval rested his chin on top of her head. She wished they could've shared a moment like this while he was still alive.

"I respected you…" she repeated, "You were my friend. I was starting to feel more for you, much more.

"I know what it means to lose the ones you love. I know pain." Words spilled out of her uncontrollably. "You knew that. After you lost your son… If only you'd let me be there for you, Tanval. I would've stood by your side. And in time, I would've loved you – even though it would be an impossible love."

"I'm so sorry." Tanval's arms tightened their hold on Astia, one of his hands tangling in long, ginger locks, almost as red as his own.

"Despair was too strong, and I fell into madness." he admitted quietly. "And then I pushed on, in the only direction I still could see. I thought… I thought you'd never accept me after what I've done."

"Even with what you've done, I never found it in my heart to condemn you." replied Astia. "I was hoping, till the end, that we'd both survive the horrors of the Tormented Spire and Sadal. Instead, I had to watch you die."

"Astia." Tanval's voice was more firm now. "Please, look at me."

She obeyed and was surprised by the look in her friend's eyes.

"If I had survived," he said, "My House would've cast me out, and even if it hadn't, I would have left it, for there was nothing left for me there. I would've followed you into Coldharbour, and then I would've stayed, for as long as you wanted me. Do you believe me?"

"Yes." replied Astia quietly. Tanval smiled, and as he did, it seemed to her as though his whole body flickered.

"Don't go, please." she whispered.

"I have to. I am sorry."

"But you feel so real." Astia tugged on his robe to emphasise her point.

"That is Lord Sil's doing, not mine." he replied. "I wish I could stay with you, more than you know. But I cannot."

"You'll leave me alone, again." Astia sighed.

"No." Tanval Indoril smiled, a small, open smile that not many have ever witnessed, and gently kissed the vestige's forehead. "You will never be alone – you're too bright a flame. And don't waste your tears on the dead - somewhere, there is a person whose touch will not scare you. I pray you find them."

* * *

The vestige gasped as she rose abruptly from the brass bed, clutching at her tunic. She looked around, wild-eyed, until her gaze settled on a figure on the other side of the chamber, his long hair obscuring the view of whatever he was tinkering with.

"You're awake." Sotha Sil commented calmly. "I hope the dream gave you what you needed."

"I'm not sure." admitted the vestige. "I feel like… sometimes there's too much loss."

"Loss." Sotha Sil's voice trailed away. "Loss is an inevitable consequence of existing, Astia Varo. We are bound to it from the day we are born."

"That doesn't mean we have to accept it." Astia's head hung low.

"Acceptance is the only choice that keeps one sane." he retorted, a surprisingly soft note to his tone, and turned in her direction.

"Look at me, Astia Varo."

She did, meeting the intense gaze of someone who, despite being close to godhood, detached from mortal affairs, understood what true loss meant.

"I know it may be of little comfort to you," he said, "But grandmaster Indoril cared for you deeply."

"How did you know?" asked the vestige.

Sotha Sil got up unhurriedly.

"You were always in his prayers." he said, crossing the chamber to reach her. "You and his son. House Indoril is naturally more inclined towards Almalexia, but Tanval Indoril, a gifted mage, often prayed to me."

"He said you made it possible for us to see each other one last time. Was he right?"

A heavy, brass hand settled on Astia's shoulder as the one Tanval revered as his god knelt down next to a mortal.

"Yes." Admitted Sotha Sil, "I am not a god, but reaching the dead is not beyond my power.

"He prayed for me to guide you and to keep you safe, even before I met you." he added. "His spirit burned bright in life, and so did his regret, a regret you share.

"I will answer part of his prayers, Astia Varo." Sotha Sil's voice was lower now. "As for guidance, you deserve it from someone less burdened by certainty. But I will protect you. I will keep you safe.

"And don't fault me for giving you something I felt you needed." he added.

"And what is that, my lord?" asked the vestige somewhat bitterly.

Sotha Sil looked at her solemnly, his features tinted by sadness.

"Closure." he said, and the vestige suddenly felt ashamed, for he was right.

"You never got yours." She stated, again quite sure she was right.

The Clockwork god nodded.

"Indeed." he admitted, "The one I wish I could talk to is far even beyond my reach."

He didn't have to say who he meant by that; the vestige already knew. The fallen king. Nerevar.

"Thank you for doing this for me." She said, covering the brass fingers on her shoulder with her own. "However, I feel I have overstayed my welcome, my lord. I will return to my own house for now."

Sotha Sil nodded.

"Too formal as usual, Astia Varo." he replied. "I will see you again."

If anybody else said the words, they would sound strange, but Astia already knew better.

"Very well, my lord." she said, and got up to leave. Bone croaked and immediately flew towards her to perch on her shoulder. "Be well until next I see you."

She walked towards the door and turned around briefly before exiting. Sotha Sil was at work again, not paying her any more attention.

The vestige smiled.


	5. Chapter 5

**The Power of Words**

"Are you all right?" Kireth swooped down on Astia like a hawk as soon as the Imperial entered their shared house.

The vestige looked around the common room, surprised to see not only the Vanos siblings and Neramo, but also provost Arvel.

"You were summoned by lord Seht, weren't you?" asked Varuni quietly. "I heard the apostles talk."

Before Astia could reply, Bone croaked loudly from his perch on her shoulder, startling all present. Varuni's eyes were wide in surprise, Kireth's head tilted in curiosity, but Neramo and Raynor both jumped to their feet, asking a dozen question at once and trying to reach the brass bird. Neramo tried to touch it, but immediately hissed and withdrew his hand, having met with the brass beak.

Astia chuckled.

"He will not let you take him apart to satisfy your curiosity, Neramo." Bone clanked his beak angrily as if to confirm her words, but calmed down when she patted him on the head lightly.

"Lord Seht made him, didn't he?" Varuni approached as well, observing the bird, her voice full of awe. "I heard rumors in the Basilica, but didn't believe them until now. Indeed, no apostle can match our lord's skill."

"I am sorry to have worried all of you." said Astia, deciding to ignore Varuni's comment.

"What did he want from you?" asked Neramo curiously, and Varuni immediately shot him an angry glance for being too disrespectful.

The vestige hesitated before answering.

"Lord Sil told me I couldn't return to Tamriel yet." she said eventually.

"That's it?" Neramo's brows rose in disbelief. "You were gone for almost twenty four hours."

"I… he…" the vestige stammered a bit, but eventually shook her head.

"Stop interrogating me, Neramo." she said and immediately regretted the sharp tone she did not intend.

"I'm sorry." she added more quietly. "I didn't meant to snap at you. I just really, really do not want to talk about it."

"Leave her be, you insufferable mage." Kireth stepped in front of Astia, her arms crossed over her chest. Being a big sister came naturally to her, and the vestige smiled faintly, before excusing herself to find shelter in the privacy of her bedroom.

* * *

About two hours after she came back home, Astia heard a knock on her door.

"Can I come in?" asked Kireth quietly.

"Of course, Kireth."

The mer entered immediately and closed the door behind her. She then sat next to the vestige on the brass bed.

"Did you not want to talk about whatever you discussed with lord Seht in front of everyone?" she asked, "Or do you not wish to discuss it at all?"

"I…" the vestige paused, "Very well. You asked me before if there was someone special in my life, you remember?"

Kireth nodded.

"Yes." she confirmed. "Is that what you and lord Seht spoke of? That's surprising. You never told me who the man in your life was, only that he died."

The vestige hesitated, but then decided to press on. She was tired of keeping secrets.

"Tanval Indoril." she said, and Kireth looked back at her, shocked.

"A grandmaster." she said eventually, shaking her head. "Did the two of you… how long?"

"No, no." replied Astia immediately. "You asked if there was someone special, and there was; I was starting to feel something more for him, but I never got the courage to tell him, and then everything went to Oblivion, leading to his death. It still hurt a lot – he was a cherished friend."

"Astia…" Kireth placed her hand on the vestige's shoulder and Astia supressed her instinctual reaction to shake it off. "I hate to tell you this, but this would never have worked out. I made it my business to learn all I could about potential benefactors Raynor and I could approach, and House Indoril was among them.

"They would never have allowed this match." she continued. "Grandmaster Indoril had been widowed for many years and the House was pressing him to remarry; still, dunmeri great houses are set in their ways. You may be of noble birth, but you are not a dunmer. Even if grandmaster Indoril shared your feelings…"

"He did."

"I thought you said you never confessed."

"I didn't." Astia shook her head.

"Then how do you know?"

"Lord Sil. He made it possible for us to speak, one last time." said Astia quietly, ignoring Kireth's startled expression. "Tanval came to me in my dream. He said…"

"He said he would've followed me into Coldharbour. That he would've stayed with me." She was relieved she could confide in a friend.

"I don't know what to say." admitted Kireth. "You hide your feelings well, Astia. I never would've suspected grandmaster Indoril was the one you spoke of."

"It no longer matters." sighed the vestige. "At first I was angry with lord Sil, before I understood the value of his gift. He said I needed closure, and he was right. I will be alright now – I just need some time to digest what happened. It was a feeling that was cut short before it could fully develop, and I am finally ready to put it to rest."

Kireth stretched and leaned back comfortably against a wall.

"I am glad to hear that, my friend." she said. "But let me say, you aim high. First a grandmaster, now a god."

Astia's eyes widened in surprise.

"By the Eight! Kireth, you did not just say that."

The elf shrugged.

"You were summoned to the Sacristy and stayed overnight, which, as I hear, has not happened before." she said, "People talk, though not many I heard condemn you. Some are jealous."

The vestige was mortified.

"People are wrong." she said quickly, "And how can you even say something like that? You're a dunmer! Isn't it a heresy?"

Kireth smiled.

"The Clockwork City is rubbing off on me it seems. Heresy is encouraged here, and I find it much more interesting than piety."

"Oh gods… Has Varuni heard these rumours?"

"I am sure she has." replied Kireth. "But what do you care? Let people talk all they want. It's not like any of it will ever reach Tamriel."

"She is going to hate me."

"I see where you're coming from." Kireth admitted. "Our apostle friend is quite obsessed with lord Seht, but you should know by now she doesn't have one hateful bone in her.

"Though," she winked, "she may look at you in a different way."

Astia groaned, glad she didn't share more details regarding her encounter with the Clockwork God.

"If it were Almalexia you joked about like this, I have a suspicion she'd end you, you dunmeri heretic. Vivec would likely be proud to be a character in such a story and he'd boast. You are lucky it is lord Sil you speak of in such manner – I doubt he'd care even if he knew."

Kireth looked at the vestige in silence for quite a long while.

"Curious thing, words." she said eventually. "They betray a lot."

"I don't know what you mean, Kireth."

"Almalexia. Vivec. Lord Sil." replied Kireth, emphasising the title. "Only one of them deserves utmost respect in your eyes, you imperial formalist. And if memory serves me right, you always addressed king Jorunn with proper titles in his presence, but not when out of his earshot. It seems there are only precious few who meet your high standards."

"Oh." Astia's brow furrowed. "I never noticed."

"Do you know who else you always spoke of with such formality, Astia?" Kireth had a sly look on her face. "Grandmaster Indoril."

"This is because I _did_ respect him a lot!" replied Astia defensively. "And lord Sil deserves all the respect I can give him – he's worth more than Almalexia and Vivec combined, not mentioning Jorunn, who wants to lead the Pact and cannot even handle his own brat of an heir!"

"I am sorry, Kireth." The vestige was ashamed of her outburst, though she spoke truthfully. It wasn't like her to not be in control of her emotions, it must still be the residual effect of what had happened in the Sacristy.

Kireth regarded her calmly.

"I never said lord Seht didn't command respect, though I am sure he doesn't need you to defend him." The elf's expression grew more serious all of a sudden. "Be very careful, Astia. Remember where that utmost respect took you last time. I do not want you to get hurt."

The vestige shook her head.

"What you speak of… it's impossible." she said. "You have nothing to worry about."

Kireth kept looking at the vestige, her gaze more intense than usual.

"For your sake, I hope you are right, my friend. Mortals shouldn't meddle with gods, even mortals as exceptional as you, vestige."

"Lord Sil is not a god." replied Astia, and cursed herself for not biting her tongue.

"Perhaps." Kireth's calculating gaze did not lose any of its intensity. "But he is something that defies logic and understanding. It would be in your best interest not to forget that."


	6. Chapter 6

**_A/N:_** _Another chapter ready; I'd be happy to learn what you think. One sentence in Italic is taken directly from the game. Enjoy!_

* * *

 **Scars**

"Hurry up, Astia." There was impatience in Raynor's voice as he led her towards a structure that looked like a broken clock tower.

"Look at this!" he exclaimed happily, his pace increasing, and the vestige smiled behind his back.

She was surprised when Kireth revealed she had had a falling out with Raynor; they were both her dear friends, but the vestige didn't want to meddle in family affairs. It was with great reluctance that she finally relented to Kireth's pleading tone, urging her to accompany Raynor on his quest to admire the many unknowns of the Clockwork City and theorize their purpose, all the while trying to mend things between the siblings. At the moment however, she was grateful; something in Raynor's childlike sense of wonder and enthusiasm had always made him endearing to Astia and now it seemed to be rubbing off on her.

Lately, she had been trying to come to terms with the many losses she'd experienced in more than a year, and being able to see Tanval for one last time helped her in achieving a state of quiet, solemn acceptance. At least she could say goodbye to him, something she couldn't do with her parents or brother; for them she would drive the daedra out of their homeland, to honour their memory, and maybe at the end of her journey she would finally be able to put all her spirits to rest, along with the pain that kept haunting her.

"Wait for me!" The vestige started running to catch up with the self-proclaimed expert on all things dwemer, Bone flying close and following her.

When she joined him, Raynor speculated on the tower's function, wondering if its mechanism reached many levels below them. Astia nodded here and there, enjoying his animated gestures and how his face lit up as he came up with one hypothesis after another.

"It's magnificent! I don't see any method to determine…" he paused mid-sentence, eyes growing wide, looking behind her.

"What is it?" asked the vestige, wondering what outlandish hypothesis made him pause like that. Raynor loved talking.

"Astia Varo." The sudden sound of a voice very close behind her made the vestige jump and let out an undignified yelp not quite befitting the hero of the Pact. Bone dug his claws in her leather armor, croaking.

She spun around, silently cursing the way her heart hammered in her chest. Sudden sounds didn't always use to startle her. She could feel her cheeks burn in embarrassment.

Sotha Sil looked at her calmly, his hands crossed behind his back.

"Good day, my lord." said the vestige somewhat weakly.

"Come with me." he replied, ignoring her greeting.

Astia's brows furrowed.

"I promised Raynor I'd go back with him to the Brass Fortress." she said, worried she could offend the Clockwork God, but she gave her word and she was going to respect it.

"Oh, it's fine, Astia." Raynor now stood by her side, looking mildly uncomfortable and surprised. "I can go back on my own."

He bowed awkwardly.

"No." protested Astia immediately. Raynor was a gifted scholar, but he wasn't adept at fighting and she worried for him.

Before she could continue, Raynor suddenly disappeared.

"I sent him to the house you currently share." said Sotha Sil, paying no attention to the vestige's shocked expression. His hand locked on her shoulder, and everything around them went dark, only to explode in brightness barely a second later.

The sorcerer let go of her and the vestige stumbled a bit, looking around and doing her best to recover after what seemed to be a spatial journey requiring no portal. They were standing on a bridge spanning the chasm between the Brass Fortress and the main area of the Radius, short distance from a tall, impressive tower.

"I know where we are." said Astia, finally recognising her surroundings. "I often look at this tower from the Fortress' gates. I have been curious about what's inside for a while."

"Good." Sotha Sil nodded. "Feel free to explore. It is yours."

"Mine?" the vestige spun around to look at the Clockwork God, shocked.

"Correct." he confirmed. "I am still unclear on when I can send you back to Tamriel. I am aware you share a small dwelling close to Machine District with several of your companions. This housing offers more space."

"You cannot give me a tower, my lord." tried the vestige. "It is too much for me to accept."

"I already did." replied Sotha Sil and walked towards the tower's entrance, the vestige trying to match his long strides. "I had Luciana submit the necessary decree to one of the adjuncts."

Behind his back, the vestige barely supressed a groan. Sotha Sil hadn't summoned her for almost two weeks; just as Divayth Fyr had said once, the Clockwork God's sense of time did not work in a similar way to their own. During that time, Astia was surprised to find she missed the conversations they'd had a little, even though sometimes they proved exasperating, but at the same time she enjoyed the fact that the rumours that sprang up after the night she had spent at the Sacristy seemed to have died down somewhat. That was bound to change again, she realised with a start, and she didn't like it one bit. Unable to help herself, she shot an accusatory glance in the sorcerer's direction, but he didn't notice.

"Varuni, please don't hate me." she said quietly, sighed and sped up her pace.

Sotha Sil held the tower's door open and beckoned her in. As much as she loathed to admit it, the tower put a spell on Astia as soon as she crossed its threshold. The vaulted ceiling that spanned high above the floor vaguely reminded her of the Temple of the One in the Imperial City and the tall windows let a lot of light in. When she looked outside, she could see the vastness of the Radius, the Brass Fortress and the revolving parts of the celestiodrome, the chasm below giving an illusion of immense space in this relatively small, contained world. The tower was relatively close to the Fortress, but far enough to give more privacy. Bone stretched his wings on her shoulder and clanked his beak.

"Fly, explore." she urged the bird, and the crow flew off.

"Do you like it?" she heard from behind her.

Astia turned around to look at Sotha Sil, decision made. The rumours would reappear regardless, and so she might as well make the best of the situation she was in. Neramo, Kireth and Raynor would love this place.

"Yes, my lord." she nodded. "It is wonderful. Thank you."

"Good." Sotha Sil's face remained perfectly neutral. "I feel this dwelling suits you better."

"I am grateful, but I need no other gifts, my lord."

"And yet you shall continue receiving them, until you tell me what you want for yourself." The Clockwork God reminded her.

"It's really not necessary."

"Oh, but it is. You deserve it – the Prisoner who may yet free us all."

Astia couldn't hide a grimace and he noticed.

"What is it, Astia Varo?"

"Nothing, my lord." she tried, but Sotha Sil simply continued to gaze at her, motionless, unnerving, likely to stay this way until he got the answer he was asking for.

"I dislike how you sometimes refer to me as a prisoner, my lord." she admitted eventually.

"Why?" he asked, "It makes you superior to me – after all, you can see the door in the cell that is this world, while I cannot*."

"Do you really think that everything happens because it must, my lord?" she asked in turn, "That just as you told me that day in the Elegiac Replication, you stand here because you have to, not because you want to?"

"You know I do, Astia Varo." he replied. "But I also know you well enough to understand that this is your way of disagreeing with me, veiled in the guise of formality you are so very attached to given you already disagreed with me openly once in this conversation."

Astia nodded almost imperceptibly and averted her gaze.

"Quite often, I loathe the burden of certainty I carry." said the sorcerer. "It tells me that your dislike of the term and the last opinion you expressed is deeply rooted in your past, in whatever event that made you terrified of any touch different to clash of blades and armor in battle."

The vestige's body grew rigid, her hands balling into fists without conscious thought, but she remained silent under the Clockwork God's scrutiny.

"Regret leaves many scars even when shared, Astia Varo. But if hidden, it displays a tendency to torment you indefinitely. I know this truth intimately."

"Why… why did you use these precise words?" the vestige managed to choke out, her fear of losing control gradually increasing.

"I felt I had to."

Astia's choked breath sounded dangerously close to a sob; she was sure Sotha Sil noticed, and felt ashamed. She knew what was coming, and the closeness of unwanted memories put her on edge.

"Tell me." said the sorcerer.

She shook her head vigorously, scared, unsure how to mold her memories into words, wary of sharing them with anyone.

"Then show me."

The vestige finally looked back at him.

"How?" she managed.

"Sit down." replied Sotha Sil, and she obeyed, sitting down cross-legged on the floor, unable to determine what made her agree to his request. "Close your eyes. You only need to think, not speak."

"Touching your mind requires no physical touch." he added, and Astia nodded and did as instructed.

She hated the memories, and yet couldn't be rid of them. Thinking of her past was harrowing, but instinctual – and it took no time for her to be flooded by images that repeatedly crept their way into her dreams, until even the friends she lived with were used to her screams at night. Until they stopped trying to help, after being repeatedly rejected, attributing Astia's state to the Three Banners War and hoping it would pass. Now that she was about to share her past with the Clockwork God, she felt terrified and ashamed. As soon as she had the thought, a wave of calm washed over her as she could suddenly feel an uncanny feeling of patience and warmth on the fringes of her consciousness. She released a shaky breath and did her best to concentrate. Images started flashing before her mind's eye before she knew it and their intensity immediately made her forget that this time she was not the only witness to the anguish they left in their wake.

* * *

"Let go of me!" she struggled against the guard captain's hold, Bruma's chilly air filling her lungs as she inhaled it in uneven gasps. "I need to go to them, let me go!"

"They're gone, lady Astia." the old soldier's voice seemed choked and small, as small as she felt when she realised the daedra massacred their household, including her parents.

"They're coming." The man's whisper made the hair rise on the back of her neck. She looked at her companion; his eyes were wide and terrified, yet full of desperate courage that comes in the face of certain death, a courage she'd only ever read of in old stories and never expected to witness firsthand.

The old soldier closed Astia's fingers around the hilt of a spare sword he managed to grab from the mansion's small armory and squeezed, forcing her to grab the weapon. As soon as she did, he let go and she could see his own hand tightening on the hilt of his sword, knuckles almost as white as the snow around them that slowly melted away as the roaring fires of Oblivion devoured the city she loved, a place that felt more like home than the capital.

"You have to go, lady Astia." he said, and Astia shook her head vigorously. "Hurry."

"We have to go, together." she replied.

"No, child." The soldier smiled at her sadly. "If both of us run, they will catch us in no time."

"I won't leave you!" she tried to protest. "I have nothing left."

Captain Civianus' gaze hardened.

"And what of the Empire?" he asked, "What fate awaits it if everyone gives up? No, lady Astia. Go north, and try to reach any of the Pact garrisons on the border. It's our only chance after the capital ignored our missives."

The hoarse screams of the daedra sounded much closer now. There were so many, too many for any courage to repel.

"Run, girl!" screamed the captain.

"May the Eight protect you." was the last thing Astia heard as she turned around and ran, choking on her tears.

* * *

One of the daedra managed to catch up with her. She bested it, fueled by despair and rage, but not before it slashed at her sword arm. Astia fell to her knees next to the carcass, breathing heavily. She didn't know how long she knelt there, but finally forced her exhausted body to move.

It seemed like she had been walking for days on end, tired and unaware of the passage of time, so very hungry, living off snow berries and snow she'd melt in her mouth, the arduous trek through the Jerall Mountains a slow torture. Her feverish brain drifted back to the dead daedra and the crimson of its blood sinking into the snow.

' _I should have eaten it,'_ she thought, but her empty stomach churned in disgust.

She'd never wandered that far from Bruma and vaguely remembered that according to her father, it shouldn't take more than two days on foot to cross the Jeralls into Skyrim. She hoped she wasn't walking in circles. Unused to trekking through the wilderness, Astia didn't know how to properly forage for food and she was too weak to track and hunt down any kind of game. She hoped she would stumble upon one of the hunters' shacks in the forests where she could find sustenance and rest to increase her chances of reaching Skyrim. She wasn't sure how she could cross the mountains in her current state, but stubbornly refused to worry about it until she was forced to.

In her tiredness a heavy, black and red shield she took off the daedra's corpse was weighing her down as if it was made of lead. Astia took a shaky breath and forced herself to take another step, and then one more. Suddenly, she thought she could see a darker, regular shape in the distance and ran towards it in a last, desperate effort.

As she'd hoped, it was a hunters' shack, though its darkness and lack of smoke meant it was likely empty. To Astia's surprise, the door was open. She burst in, rummaging through the barrels and sacks, her mouth watering when she found a stash of dried meat. She devoured part of it greedily and forced herself to slow down, knowing eating too much could make her sick, and reasoning that she needed as much food as she could gather to complete her journey. Exhausted beyond measure, she huddled in a corner and fell into a fitful sleep.

She awoke to sounds of several voices and a hoarse laughter. She opened her eyes, trying to adjust her vision to sudden appearance of torchlight. A stranger was leaning towards her; she still struggled to see, but noticed the dark, ashen tone of his face. At first she sighed in relief, but then a clawed hand grabbed her hair and yanked painfully, and she screamed.

The stranger was no dunmer.

* * *

They didn't kill her. At least, this was a relief, Astia thought. As long as she lived, she had a chance to run away. She was intensely aware of her surroundings; the damp, cold air of the cave made her shiver in musty, ragged clothes she was forced to wear and the voices carried through the corridors with an eerie intensity, as if every speaker had a ghostly twin echoing their words.

There were three other captives with her in the cell – two Nords and an Imperial. At first she tried to talk to them, obtain their help to prepare a plan of escape, shocked by their apathy, empty stares and silence.

When the hooded figures came for her, she didn't know how much time has passed. They dragged her through the damp, cold passages, two men in dark robes, until they finally reached a bigger cavern and pushed her onto a rough, stone table. She tried to fight, but the days of wandering through the mountains with no proper sustenance weakened her too much, powerless when they tore the rags off her body and locked metal shackles over her wrists, ankles and waist, the iron biting painfully into her skin.

The first cut arched her back off the stone with the sudden pain and Astia screamed, feeling blood dripping down her chest, hot in the chilly air of the cave, but the two hooded figures gave her no rest. More cuts followed, deep and senseless, until her throat grew hoarse from screaming.

"Heal her." she heard a voice, "We don't want her to die."

"Well, not yet." answered the other voice and chuckled.

Astia experienced healing spells in the past and the one she was subjected to was nothing like what she'd known. It was meant to emphasise the pain, amplify it as the torn flesh and muscles stitched themselves back together. After they were done, the two men dragged her back to the cell and threw her on the cold, rocky ground. Astia cried and rocked in pain, finally understanding why the other prisoners never reacted when she'd asked for help.

When her captors returned the next day, Astia kicked and screamed under the empty gaze of her fellow prisoners, only to be overpowered easily, dragged to the torture chamber and strapped to the stone table again. Before her left arm got locked in a shackle, one of the men grabbed it and squeezed painfully, muttering words she did not understand. His grasp intensified and he laughed at her cries, until with a horror Astia could hear her bones snap and howled in pain. They cut into her body, enjoying her cries and pleas to stop, and healed her again, though left her broken arm untreated.

The time that followed blurred into one long stretch of pain and misery, as the two men kept inflicting pain on her with blades and spells, laughing when she cried for help, unable to stop herself and desperately wanting for someone, anyone to hear her and free her from the torment. The torturers always healed her, but only enough to not let her die, letting the cuts and burns mark her as proof of their skill.

She would scream, begging them to tell her what they wanted from her, pleading to let her go home, forgetting there was no home to go back to. She would do anything to escape the torment, but it never ceased. Finally a day came when she could no longer scream, her throat too hoarse, and was too weak to struggle as they hurt her. One of her torturers roughly grabbed her by the neck, asking if they were not engaging enough for her, and she managed to croak out only to words.

"Kill me."

They looked at each other, satisfied, though she failed to understand why.

When they shackled her to the table the next time, there was another person in the chamber – an Altmer. Astia barely registered how he looked like and looked up at him from her shackles, too resigned and hurt to put up a fight.

"So delightfully, utterly broken." she heard and felt cold fingers brush her face. She squeezed her eyes shut, unable to escape his touch. There was something terrifying about it, as if it left frost bites in its wake, as if she was being touched by death.

The touch stopped, and Astia opened her eyes, only to see the Altmer raise a dagger above her and felt almost deliriously happy, even when excruciating pain flooded her as the blade plunged in her chest.

* * *

Before she could stop it, Astia let out a loud, anguished cry. She took her head in her hands, fingernails digging painfully into her scalp as she rocked back and forth, unable to stop sobbing. Just like before, she felt a wave of calm, soothing presence that helped her get a first, shaky grip on herself. She looked up at Sotha Sil, eyes still full of tears she was too tired to be ashamed of anymore.

"Tell me, my lord…" she started shakily, "Did this have to happen as well? Was I destined for this torment? Were my parents destined to die like that? Was captain Civianus? Was… my brother? If everything is result of action and consequence as you say… pray tell, what action of mine caused it?"

"Was there anything I could have done to avoid my fate?" she asked, eyes boring into his. "And please, do not tell me it was necessary to shape me into who I am… It didn't make me stronger; it wrecked me."

"I will say no such thing, Astia Varo." said the sorcerer calmly. "There is no deeper purpose to the suffering that the daedra and their followers unleash upon this world."

"Captain Civianus died for nothing. They got me anyway." whispered the vestige, getting up and doing her best to stand straight. She was still shaking. "There was no information I could give them. Nor did they want any. They merely enjoyed inflicting as much pain as they could without killing me, tormenting me for their own pleasure, honing their skills, breaking me before Mannimarco tore my soul out."

"I saw Mannimarco in Coldharbour." she added quietly, "Tortured like I had been, at the mercy of the daedra, yet still hurling insults. I watched him squirm, and left him to rot. It takes a person much better than I to forgive that kind of evil."

She then took a deep breath, wanting to ask for a boon she never thought possible, despite her multiple earlier statements that she needed no gratitude from him.

"My lord…" she hesitated for a brief moment, "Some time ago you said you could alter my memory to forget I offered to guard you in your sleep. Can you… alter my memories so I don't have to…"

Sotha Sil raised his hand before she had a chance to finish.

"A small, inconsequential exchange of words we had – yes. Happenings of this magnitude, this life altering – no." he said, and the vestige's face fell. "I wish I could erase the memories of your past. Alas, even I only have enough power to conceal them, offering merely a temporary respite. Eventually, the discontinuity of your thoughts could make them resurface, and sudden influx of pain and suffering of such intensity would have disastrous consequences. I will not have you suffer such fate."

"But all these scars marring your body…" Sotha Sil seemed pensive. "Any good healer could have removed them."

The vestige only looked towards the floor.

"You never asked anyone to do that." Said the Clockwork God. "You were ashamed. You didn't want anybody to see, to look at you and touch you, as the scars make you feel dirty. Humiliated. Damaged."

Astia could hear him approach; he stopped a few steps away from her.

"You are not damaged. You are so much more." he said. "I saw Coldharbour, Astia Varo. I walked through its horrors and despair. I will say this again – _I've met few heroes like you. Very few._ "

The vestige looked up at Sotha Sil and gazed upon him for a long while, but it was only understanding she could see, not pity. She was grateful for that, but his next words still startled her.

"I need neither to look, nor touch."

She weighed his words carefully, and eventually nodded.

"Good." Sotha Sil closed his eyes. Then he reached towards Astia and her leathers and under clothes gently slid off her body, like water. His hands started emitting an orange glow, hovering millimetres above her skin, exuding warmth, but not touching. She didn't know how long she stood in front of the Clockwork God, bare, but no longer shivering, enveloped in a warm, soothing cocoon of his magicka. He kept moving his hands over her chest, arms, shoulders, back and neck, pausing every now and then above old cuts and burns; whenever he did, Astia could feel the warmth intensify as the marks that shamed her disappeared one by one. When she felt herself being lifted in the air like before, she wasn't startled. Sotha Sil's hands now moved over her lower body and when he was done, he gently lowered her back on the ground, hands still hovering as Astia's clothing slid back up her body as if it was made of silk and took its previous shape.

Once her armor settled back on her, the sorcerer took a few steps back, and only then did he open his eyes. Astia's throat was too tight to speak as she struggled to express the tumult of emotions she was experiencing, but Sotha Sil only looked back at her, calm, ever patient.

He extended his hand towards her and waited, as if he had all the time in the world. Eventually the vestige took it, shaking fingers of flesh wrapping around artificial ones and squeezing tight, as if trying to draw strength from the brass palm they held. The world around them flickered, and seconds later Astia looked around, surprised to find herself in her bedroom in the small house she shared with her friends. The Clockwork God stood before her, motionless, his height and presence giving an illusion as though he was filling most of the room.

"Be safe till next I see you, Astia Varo." he said, and then she was alone.

She undressed and hesitantly walked towards a large mirror on the wall next to the door; ever since her ordeal she disliked her own nakedness even when alone, hating how disfigured and tainted her body felt. Eventually she looked in the mirror and gasped, met with the sight of unblemished skin. She was so used to managing pain on a daily basis that it took her a while to realise that the recurring pain in her shield arm was gone; after the cultists broke it, it never got a chance to heal properly. Even though Astia had the worst of it healed by Walks-In-Ash, the dull, pulsing pain seemed ever-present, until now, its sudden absence testimony to almost-divine powers of Sotha Sil. She knew that mental scars would take much longer to heal and perhaps would remain indefinitely, but even so, she felt overwhelming gratitude to be rid of their visual proof. The chasm in her soul seemed to have narrowed almost imperceptibly, but it meant much.

"Thank you." she whispered. "Thank you for showing me a door."

* * *

 _ **A/N:**_ *These words refer to Sotha Sil's words at the end of The Clockwork City DLC: _"The prisoner must see the door to their cell. They must gaze through the bars and perceive that which exists beyond causality. Beyond time. Only then can they escape. I see only unsteady walls."_


	7. Chapter 7

**Corridors of Light**

For a couple of days after Sotha Sil removed all the scars and pain, Astia felt as though part of the warm, glowing energy he'd enveloped her in remained in a thin, invisible layer all over her skin. Breathing seemed easier, though not even the Clockwork God's residual magicka could make her forget the traumatic events of her past.

For a few nights, the vestige slept undisturbed, heavy, dreamless, knowing the respite wouldn't last yet enjoying it as it did; still, when she awoke one day feeling colder in the absence of Sotha Sil's energy that had eventually dissipated, she knew the following night would likely no longer be calm.

* * *

The pain was overwhelming, and there was nothing she could do to stop it. Blades and magic bit into Astia's skin, muscle deep, a senseless assault of cruelty she couldn't have deserved; not many could. As always, she cried for help in pointless, hoarse sentences, no longer aware of what words tore out of her sore throat, and then just in wordless screams.

Suddenly, it stopped, and Astia was too scared to open her eyes for a long while, expecting the pain to return any moment. When she kept waiting and it didn't, she eventually opened her eyes slowly, carefully, her body rigid in an unwanted tension.

She saw a tall figure facing away from her, standing between her and her torturers, long hair flowing down his back. He turned towards her and she wanted to scream, to warn him, afraid they would hurt him too, but then noticed they were alone. She knew him. She knew him from somewhere, and there was no pain she associated with him.

"They cannot hurt you anymore." he said, his unusual, dual tone sounding familiar.

He touched her, and the pain stopped as if it never existed and she finally remembered his name.

"This is a dream, isn't it?" she asked.

Sotha Sil nodded.

"How are you in my dream? Is it my imagination, or are you really here?"

"I am here."

He extended his hand towards her, and Astia took it and rose from the bed of stone and blood, no longer surprised when suddenly she was clothed and warm.

"Fine, my lord." she conceded. "You can obviously be here, but why?"

"You called for me."

Astia couldn't hide her surprise, even though she was now talking to a demigod in her own dreamscape.

Sotha Sil only looked back at her, silent.

"Wake up." he said eventually, and immediately the vestige rose in her own bed in the tower gifted to her by the same demigod who had just slipped into her nightmare and ended it.

Maybe she should feel like her privacy had been violated, she thought, but all she felt was gratefulness. She sat up, back against the wall, hands clenching and unclenching on the covers as she breathed in an out, doing her best to relax.

In the slow, dark moments that followed Astia felt all too alone, and her next thought shocked her; she realised that if Sotha Sil was there with her, outside the dream, with all his fathomless silence, if she could lean against him, she wouldn't mind. In fact, she'd welcome it.

His sudden appearance should have probably shocked her more, but it didn't, not truly.

"You mind was still open to me. Do not worry, it no longer is."

The vestige thought that if he wanted, Sotha Sil could likely open up her mind any time he so wished. It should terrify her. It didn't.

"Divayth Fyr said you never changed your routine." she said, "Why would you do this?"

"Divayth doesn't know me as much as he thinks he does."

"Why did you step into my dream?" Astia asked again.

"I told you, you called for me."

"Do you make a habit of visiting the dreams of others, my lord?"

The prolonged silence hung above them in the dark, almost palpable.

"No." replied Sotha Sil eventually, just when she thought he chose to ignore her question. "I promised I would protect you. And I am not your lord."

"Perhaps, but you seem to forget the difference in our status."

"When you screamed for help, you didn't use that title you seem to cling to so much in your waking hours, Astia Varo. You called for me by my name only. 'Sil' – you called me repeatedly, loud enough to reach me from your dream."

All of a sudden, the vestige was glad for the darkness that hid the sudden blush on her cheeks.

"I apologise."

"Don't."

"Then at least accept my thanks."

"There is no need to thank me for fulfilling a promise I made willingly to honor the memory of a mer who cared for you. Although it surprised me it wasn't him you called for. I did not account for that."

He was right; the vestige found it bizarre as well. She pondered his words for a while, arriving at no plausible conclusion, before she decided to ask again, ask for something she felt she desperately needed.

"Are you…" the vestige hesitated for a moment, but soon pressed on. "You asked me what I wanted for myself; I am willing to risk whatever consequences of memory removal. I'll take my chances rather than face this almost every night."

"No, you will not." The sudden harshness of Sotha Sil's normally calm tone startled her. "What you ask for is not a boon, it's a curse that I will not have you suffer."

"Rest now." he added, and Astia understood the discussion was over. "Rest, like you wanted."

The vestige seemed hesitant.

"Come." Sotha Sil urged her, "There will be no more nightmares tonight; that I can promise."

Eventually, the vestige leaned against him like she had imagined she would, too exhausted to cling to formality, head resting against his shoulder, arms barely touching.

She sighed, listening in to the barely audible whirring inside Sotha Sil's body, proof of how much he decided to replace with infallible mechanisms. At first, the vestige was surprised by the lack of her usual fight or flight response, before it hit her that it had never appeared in Sotha Sil's presence even before that moment. She didn't feel fear. She felt safe, and sleepy.

She woke up feeling rested but alone, wondering if what happened at night was simply a figment of her imagination, feeling cold. Whether it was real or imaginary – the strangeness, the silence, the soothing whirring of Sotha Sil's mechanical heart – she realized missed it.

Bone croaked, drawing her attention. The bird's eyes glowed, and when it opened its beak, she could hear a very familiar voice.

"Go to the Mnemonic Planisphere, Astia Varo. There, you will understand."

She would go, of course, she was curious. But most of all, she was relieved as she realised she did not imagine the sorcerer's comforting presence amidst darkness and fear where he shone like a beacon, a light beckoning her through the maze of her night terrors. Astia remembered then it was the precise meaning of his name in dunmeris – light.

How strange, she thought, and how fitting.

"Sil." she said quietly, "Sil."

She liked the sound of this name and she realised she liked saying it. Her small discovery was quickly followed by a decisive shake of her head.

* * *

"I am leaving for a day or two." announced the vestige as she entered the tower's main chamber.

"Where to?" it was Neramo who asked, but all three of her friends were observing her somewhat apprehensively.

After Sotha Sil's healing, Astia finally gathered enough courage to be honest with them and share just what in her past had caused her to wake up screaming so many times. They were shocked, comforting and grateful she told them, and now tried their best not to hover, mostly failing.

"Mnemonic Planisphere."

"Do you need…"

Astia raised her hand quickly, stopping Kireth.

"I am grateful for your offer, but I want to go alone."

"Well, almost alone." she added, patting Bone on the head affectionately. The brass crow croaked affirmatively. Astia waved at her friends and walked towards the door, turning away from the warmth of their worried glances.

* * *

Mnemonic Planisphere was not what Astia had imagined it to be; for one – it was overrun by the remnants of Nocturnal's cultist, and worry temporarily pushed down the awe she had felt at first upon entering the structure and realising she was standing within Sotha Sil's memories.

She had helped the Astronomer's apprentice guide the stars back to their constellations and dispatched the cultists, amazed by the fear she felt throughout the ordeal – not for herself, but for Sotha Sil, terrified that if the cultists succeeded, he would be hurt, never the same. She wanted to protect him, she realised, just like he had protected her before.

What she learned next stung with disappointment. Astia couldn't believe that in order to preserve his memories, Sotha Sil would erase those of another. The Astronomer was calm, serene even in his absolute lack of emotion. Astia thought bitterly that this was the moment Luciana had warned her about – a moment when she wouldn't understand, repeatedly trying to find reason behind the Clockwork God's actions, and failing.

She talked the apprentice into leaving, unable to accept that another may undergo a sacrifice so great. The Astronomer accepted her decision with his unshakeable stoic demeanor and immediately turned around to tend to duty that had been preoccupying his mind for millennia. Astia stared at his back feeling bitter and spent in his stead. She then headed up the stairs, back into the maze of Sotha Sil's memories, unsure what she was hoping to find, pausing in one of the workshops she'd rushed through before, finally alone with the sorcerer's memories, but no longer sure if she wanted to listen.

"You are disappointed in me."

The vestige didn't turn around at the sound of Sotha Sil's voice.

"I wish…"

Astia finally faced him, surprised by the hesitation that she didn't associate with the sorcerer.

"I wish you weren't." he finished. "Although in the grand scheme of things, it matters not."

"Why would you exact such a price on one willing to serve you?" asked the vestige. She knew she had no right to ask, but for once she didn't care.

"I did not make the choice for him, Astia Varo."

Astia shook her head sadly.

"As if he'd say no to his god."

"God… if I indeed were one, I would not need him. I am not omnipotent."

Astia looked at him intently, not understanding.

"Some memories burden me and I need to keep them here, in fear that in order to be able to truly focus on my purpose, I cannot be fully connected to them." he explained, "Yet I am unwilling to part with them completely.

"The regrets and losses anchor what little mortality I have left. If I no longer had them, how would I deign to shield all those who need protection? I fear… I would no longer be able to.

"I regret what I have done to him sometimes, in the rare moments when I have the luxury of time. But I can no longer reverse it."

The vestige understood. She did. It did nothing to diminish her pity and regret for the Astronomer, though she found she could neither fully fault, not hate Sotha Sil for his actions. He was not a god; he was flawed like she was, and it wasn't her place to judge him.

"What did you hope for me to learn from this?" she asked instead, suddenly remembering why she'd come here in the first place.

"You spared the apprentice." said Sotha Sil. "Why?"

"Isn't it obvious? She would have to give up on her memories. On her personality. On whatever makes her who she is."

"And yet you'd want to share Orvas' fate?" asked Sotha Sil.

"I don't understand, my lord."

Sotha Sil approached her, his bare feet making almost no sound on the brass floor. She expected to be lifted in the air like before when he wished to talk face to face, but he leaned down towards her instead, his brass hand settling heavily over her shoulder, closer than ever before, his cheek almost touching hers.

"This is what it would take." he said quietly, and Astia's eyes widened in understanding. "To make sure those memories you fear and hate so much do not resurface. I find myself unwilling to do such a thing, and not just because my calculations prove Tamriel still needs you."

Sotha Sil rose back to his full height, towering above the vestige as he looked down at her, the ghost of his heavy touch lingering on Astia's shoulder.

"I would not wish to be the reason for that fire that burns so stubbornly, so hotly within you to die out, for your spirit to fade. Your soul was taken from you before, and I will not let it happen again."

Astia looked back at him, overcome by an emotion she failed to name, a mute, bizarre place between disappointment, gratitude and unwarranted warmth, finding no words.

"You came here looking for answers, though I cannot reassure you that you will find any that would be to your satisfaction." said Sotha Sil, "And as I have told you before, you should not expect something grand – just the bare truth, in all of its textures and shades.

"Still, you are welcome to stay as long as you wish. Once you decide you've found what you were looking for, come find me in the Basilica."

Having said that, Sotha Sil disappeared, dissipating in the air quicker than Astia's eyes could register. Left alone with her thoughts, Astia set out of the workshop, her steps echoing on the metal floor as she set on her journey through the vast, dark corridors of Sotha Sil's memories, unsure what she was hoping to learn.


	8. Chapter 8

_Thank you for all the kind words in the recent reviews - your feedback really means a lot to me. I hope you will enjoy the new chapter._

 _Italics again mark quotes taken directly from the game._

* * *

 **Castaways**

Astia walked through the dark hallways of Sotha Sil's memories, her gait hesitant, unsure. The factotums left her alone, for which she felt grateful; the truth of how the place came to be still hung heavily over her, almost like clouds of ash, remnants of storms wrought upon Ald'Ruhn by the Red Mountain.

Her mood lifted somewhat in the Warrior's wing, as she listened to stars carrying a woman's voice clearly speaking to her son; she must've been Sotha Sil's mother. The vestige couldn't help a small smile, finding it difficult, but quite amusing to try to imagine the solemn sorcerer as a child. Her improved mood continued through the memories of Sotha Sil's sister – apparently, Sotha Nall was the more mischievous of the siblings and young Sil seemed a voice of reason, a quality he'd carry into his adult life.

 _"No one will even realize we're missing. Besides, what's the worst Mother can do? A scolding?"_ a star echoed Sotha Nall's voice, triggering a chain reaction in the vestige: at first she smiled openly, but then suddenly remembered a book she'd read in the Basilica weeks before and the smile faded as quickly as it appeared. There was a reason why Sotha Nall belonged with lord Sil's regrets in the Elegiac Replication – his sister and mother had been both killed by daedra, like Astia's own family.

Astia kept wandering, unable to leave despite the constant assault of unwanted strings of words, ghostly witnesses to thoughts of a mind who once must've decided to sever them. Sotha Sil's memories kept piercing her with relentless sadness, their loneliness resonating with her more than she'd like.

In Thief's wing, another voice haunted her. Though the bones of that nameless woman likely had turned to dust centuries before, Astia felt sudden kinship and connection to her.

 _"You're just so cold to me, you never seem to open up."_

 _"I can't be with you like this. We're not equals. We never have been."_

 _"I don't wish to say goodbye, but I fear I must. We're worlds apart, you and I."_

It shouldn't have come as a surprise but it still did somehow, the realization that so many years before someone loved the one who'd later go on to become the Clockwork God, love him deeply enough to feel immense pain when his detachment gradually forced them apart. Worlds apart… Astia knew exactly how that felt like, a sad shake of her head accompanying a sudden thought.

 _Whoever you were, you shouldn't have left him. You left, and he's been all alone ever since._

She stumbled through more corridors, almost blind as she took turns randomly.

 _"Your guidance and wisdom has been invaluable to me. Where would I be without you?"_

 _"We're going to win, Sil. We have to believe that."_

 _"I'll stand beside you, my friend. Till the end."_

It wasn't Vivec's voice, unless the Warrior Poet chose to change it throughout the years, Astia doubted it though. She suspected it was the voice of Nerevar, trapped in the loop of Sotha Sil's memories.

 _"We've cursed them all. They'll be cast out. Disgraced."_

 _"My friend, what have I become?"_

The two stars circling around her spoke in Sil's voice, bringing her back with an almost unpleasant jolt.

 _"You want me to do the impossible, Vivec? I may have power, but even I cannot overcome whatever Dumac has found."_

A third star joined the chorus, encompassing Sil's frustration in its mechanical body. It was unusual, a tone she'd never experienced in their conversations. Of course, his inquisitive mind dug deeper and deeper until he finally found a solution to whatever dilemma Vivec posed, though the vestige already had a strong feeling that the result brought mostly misery.

Still, the final blow came from an unlikely source.

 _"Are you content, Lord Sotha Sil? Is there anything I can retrieve for you? A book, perhaps? Something to eat?"_

 _"How may I serve you today, Lord Sotha Sil? Do you need your clothes washed? Your hair washed? Any pets washed?"_

 _"You wish me to go to this location, Lord Sotha Sil? I would be happy to! It should only take a few years to walk there."_

It was the voice of the Precursor, the first factotum that Astia helped Associate Zanon recreate. When she'd pieced the old factotum back together, she found him quite amusing; now its voice sounded eerily pleading for an automaton. She could picture the scene almost as though she'd witnessed it herself, Sil alone in his workshop and a machine of his own creation trying to coax him out and connect in any way.

It proved too much; she wanted out of the Mnemonic Planisphere, stumbling towards what she thought must have been the exit, blinded by unwanted tears, crushed by the vast emptiness of Sil's loneliness, chased by several artificial flames that refused to leave her.

Several errant stars kept following her; they circled her head and settled to float above her shoulders before they spoke again, their stored memories the breaking point.

 _"My friend, what have I become?"_

Sotha Sil's voice in the memory was broken, anguished, hoarse. Astia stopped, frozen in place by the despaired tone that she had never heard in the sorcerer's voice.

" _We've cursed them all. They'll be cast out. Disgraced."_

 _"You want me to do the impossible, Vivec?"_

" _What have I become?"_

It hurt her to hear this normally serene tone so pained and anguished, almost as if Sotha Sil's memory was able to voice what she could not.

 _What have we both become_ , she thought. _Our families, Nerevar, Tanval… all gone_ , _while we stumble in shadows, looking for our place where there might be none._

 _"My friend, what have I become?"_ The brightest star repeated, still clinging to the vestige, an artificial messenger immune to the sadness it forever carried.

"Please, stop." Astia covered her ears and shut her eyes tightly, trying feebly to create any kind of barrier between her and the depths of Sotha Sil's grief. "Stop!"

She blindly reached behind her, trying to find purchase, any kind of support and sat down heavily on top of a tall, cluttered desk, barely hearing objects falling to the floor and Bone's alarmed croaking, trying to supress a sob clawing its way out of her tightened throat.

"Astia Varo." Her eyes opened wide in surprise, Sotha Sil's calm voice so different from the anguished one in the memory. "What has distressed you so?"

"Why are you here?" she asked, "Didn't you want me to come to you? Why do you always come?"

"I promised to protect you, I believe I have said that enough." he replied calmly, sitting down on a chair close to the desk she was resting on. "As such, I leave myself attuned to you and it was as though you screamed at me… quite disruptive."

"You cannot always come, my lord." Said the vestige quietly. "You cannot save me from every nightmare, every difficulty I face."

"Every single one? No." Admitted Sotha Sil, "But the ones I can prevent? I will certainly try. Now, tell me."

Astia remained silent, unsure how to mold her feelings into words, unsure she should.

"Very well." Sotha Sil sighed, somewhat impatiently.

"Which ones are you…" he muttered, and the vestige observed him with a frown, not knowing who he was talking to.

"Ah." he seemed satisfied. "V-742-l3, G-512-l1, K-490-l8, reabsorb."

"No!" Astia reached towards him, but it was too late; the stars Sotha Sil called upon rushed towards him, dissipating as they came into contact with the exposed skin of his forehead. The change on his face was startling to watch – the serene, sometimes curious expression Astia was used to rapidly replaced by pained grimace and a frown. The Clockwork God's head hung low then, his hair obscuring his face, his breathing labored.

"My lord…?" said the vestige quietly, unsure what to do.

"My lord?" she repeated, now scared.

Sotha Sil raised his head.

"Don't call me that." he said. "I don't want it. Not you too. Please."

He had a haunted, lost look on his face, so different from the calm and composed ruler of the Brass Fortress. Both faces were real, but this one must have usually remained hidden deep enough to be disregarded, pushed down.

"Who am I?" Sotha Sil repeated after the memory he reabsorbed, his eyes distant, but the next words differed from the past ones.

"Who have I become… Astia? Who have I become? For what?"

Astia's words died in her throat. She didn't know what to say at first, remembering Sotha Sil's words from when he had healed her, how he mentioned that unshared regret can haunt one for all time. They were alone, both alone, sharing the same darkness – grieving the ones no longer within their reach, forever changed by the times they lived in and by their own choices.

"You are… Sil." she said eventually, her tone hesitant, forcing herself to abandon the formality she so clung to and he so disliked.

She then touched his shoulder, delicately, not wanting to spook him, and slowly pulled him towards her. He was so tall that even when sitting, when she embraced him, his head fell comfortably on her shoulder. Astia held him close, not minding that he didn't return her embrace.

"Sil… Sil." she said, "You are you. Selfish in your pursuit of knowledge, always selfless towards others. You don't always have to protect me. I will protect you too."

"You already have."

"That was out of necessity. Now it's because I want to."

Sotha Sil's ragged breath tickled Astia's neck and suddenly his arms wrapped around her, knocking the breath out of her, brass fingers digging painfully into her skin even through the thick layer of leather.

"Too… strong." she managed.

"I'm sorry." he replied and tried to move away.

"Stay." Astia held him in place, impossibly close as her fingers combed through his coarse hair. "Stay like this, just a while longer."

She didn't fear this forceful, clumsy embrace; on the contrary – she finally felt something strong enough to drown out the usual despair: closeness, tenderness; beautiful, imperfect intimacy with the least likely person.

Sotha Sil's arms wrapped around her again, the embrace hesitant, too loose, not enough.

"More." pleaded the vestige, disregarding her own boldness, knowing a moment like this one was unlikely to ever repeat, directing his movements until his embrace felt just right. Sotha Sil's skin was warm on hers, his face buried in the crook of Astia's neck, and she felt close to him, a castaway like her though from another time.

She knew eventually she'd have to let go. She didn't want to. As soon as she did, he'd go back to being cryptic and inscrutable and she to the familiar desperation of wanting to return to her homeland, but not yet. For the time being, they remained still in the unusual, surprising closeness, an awkward, soothing tangle of limbs, an almost desperate pressure of one body against another, for time undetermined.

* * *

Hearing Sotha Sil's voice through Bone no longer startled the vestige; she was both glad and apprehensive to receive his summons. She paused when she first entered the Elegiac Replication, trying to sort out her own feelings as she looked at the tall silhouette in centre of the brass garden. In the recent days it seemed as though the sorcerer had taken over most of her thoughts.

Sotha Sil turned towards her, his face schooled into the usual stoic, somewhat indifferent expression, and Astia thought that he must've again detached the reabsorbed memories that had hurt him so. For a moment she simply looked back at him, realizing how starved for closeness she had been without knowing it. She wanted more of it now. She'd missed him, she realised as she walked towards him; she had missed Sotha Sil the demi-god and Sil, a son of a fallen house, friend to a fallen king.

"I'm glad you joined me." said the sorcerer. For a brief moment, the vestige fought an intense urge to reach out and touch him, but she knew better; he remained motionless, hands crossed behind his back, and so did she, looking up at him, wondering if he'd left the memory of their embrace back in the Mnemonic Planisphere, never to be retrieved.

"I have a gift for you." he announced calmly, and raised his left hand, index finger pointing upwards, stopping the vestige's protests, the gesture somehow both unnerving and endearing.

"Do not waste time on protesting… Astia." he added, the use of only her first name surprising.

He now held out his arms, palms facing the ever-revolving celestiodrome, a sword materialising out of thin air. It took Astia's breath away – fashioned after the imperial design she was used to, but shining with a captivating, coppery hue, gears and cogs adorning the hilt and continuing in delicate, etched marks along the blade.

"I named it 'Khis'," said Sotha Sil.

"A door." replied the vestige quietly.

"Indeed. Though not as strong as your spirit, this blade will never dull." he handed the sword to her. "May it always open a path for you."

"I thank you, my…"

"Don't." Sotha Sil interrupted her. "If you truly wish to thank me, you will cease addressing me with formalities I care not for."

"Thank you… Sil." The vestige managed, still finding it extremely difficult to address the sorcerer by his given name only. He nodded approvingly, seemingly oblivious to her discomfort.

"Follow me." he said, "There's more."

The vestige suppressed a sigh; she didn't want or need more gifts, and yet knew protesting was futile. They stopped in front of a pillar in the far corner of the Elegiac Replication. It looked similar to the ones dedicated to Sotha Nall and Nerevar. Astia looked up at the sorcerer.

"I know little of your parents, not enough." Sotha Sil said in response to her questioning gaze, "But this one thing I could do."

He touched the podium and Astia gasped, seeing a ghostly silhouette she knew so well. She took a closer look at the plaque and as she read, she smiled sadly.

 _Tanval Indoril – as in life, honour and love burn bright in death._

She took a deep breath before she turned to look at the Clockwork God.

"Thank you, Sil." she said.

"You needn't thank me, not for such small a thing."

"It's far from small."

"If you say so." Sotha Sil looked like his usual, inscrutable self, as if the Mnemonic Planisphere never happened. "My creativity is reaching its limits. Will you tell me what is it that you want for yourself?"

The vestige observed him in silence, the artificial light of the celestiodrome softly bathing his tired face in a muted, yellow glow and as the seconds passed, the realisation set in. It wasn't shocking; the truth had been there for a while, waiting to be acknowledged in all its hopelessness.

The vestige finally realised what she wanted for herself, and knew she could neither ask for it nor have it.


	9. Chapter 9

**What I Want**

Astia missed the wind. Strange how she hadn't realised it until this moment, sitting on a windowsill with her back against the metal wall, one leg dangling above the chasm outside the tower. Wind would feel nice, but it had no place in Sotha Sil's artificial world. She wondered if he remembered what the gusts of wind felt like and if he did – did he ever miss it.

Her fingers caressed a brass chain around her neck and closed around a pendant, the latest symbol of Sotha Sil's favour. She wished the gift expressed something more, surprised by the longing that felt as though it was etched within her, almost like the cog engraving on Sotha Sil's pendant that her fingers were tracing. Among challenges and tribulations that her life seemed to revolve around, she wished for something, someone to call her own, aware that the one she wanted was beyond her reach.

Her fingers drummed against the windowsill to the well-known rhythm of "Red Diamond", but Astia felt despondent and resigned. No matter how hard she tried, her thoughts kept circling back to the sorcerer. A movement at the bottom of the ravine caught her attention; she leaned out and observed a large fabricant before leaning back against the window.

"You're not thinking of jumping, are you?"

Astia turned towards the familiar voice.

"Don't be silly, Neramo." she replied, "Care to join me?"

"This is good enough, thank you." The altmer mage approached and leaned against the wall next to the vestige, close, but not touching.

"What's wrong, Astia?" he asked. "You seem different ever since you returned from the Mnemonic Planisphere."

"It's nothing."

Neramo smiled.

"You are a horrible liar. Gods only know how you survived meandering the Imperial Court politics for so long."

"Fine, have it your way." he said when Astia refused to answer. "I will have to guess then, though it's not difficult. Since none of us did anything to upset you as far as I'm aware, that leaves only two options. One - you are unhappy because you cannot return to Cyrodiil yet, in which case I'll tell you what I always do – it's pointless worrying over something you have no influence on.

"Or," he continued when the vestige didn't react, "It's the only other person you spend enough time with for him to be able to upset you."

The vestige tensed, and Neramo noticed immediately.

"Ah, it is the latter then. What did he do?"

"Nothing."

"Then is it 'nothing' that is the problem?"

"I don't know what you mean, Neramo. It's what you said first – I'm unhappy because I cannot go back to Cyrodiil."

She didn't dare look at him, knowing her lie would be more obvious if she did. The altmer sighed theatrically.

"Fine, I won't push. You know where to find me."

"Thank you." said Astia, not sure if he could hear her. She watched her friend leave the main tower chamber to disappear in his study and as soon as he did, her thoughts focused again on Sotha Sil.

She hoped Sil would send her home soon. At first his presence had brought her solace, reprieve from her past, but her recent realisation added a new layer that persisted even when they were apart: helplessness, resignation in the face of longing she felt towards him. She knew what it was – before it used to be a budding feeling she'd had for Tanval Indoril, cut short by his untimely death, but this time she'd overlooked the initial stage and was confronted with the full bloom, beautiful, yet doomed to wither away.

Astia knew she needed to go, distance herself as much as she could and forget. What she was feeling was not only hopeless, it was proving distracting and she couldn't afford it. She'd have to move on, yet again not revealing her feelings. They were chaotic and confusing, unwarranted and already drove a wedge between the vestige and one of her friends. Astia never understood Provost Arvel's blind loyalty to someone who she hasn't even seen; yet at present she couldn't stand the elf's proclamations of devotion, fighting jealousy and possessiveness that shouldn't exist.

In the past, Astia's feelings towards Tanval Indoril were only beginning to morph into love, but that was enough to break her heart when he died. It felt as though these intense feelings didn't take a precise shape and welled up inside her, resulting in even more hopeless circumstances she was trying to cope with at the moment. Sotha Sil didn't strike her as someone who'd be able to reciprocate what she was feeling; he wished her well and wanted to protect her, and it would have to be enough until she left. Astia doubted she'd ever see him again after her return to Cyrodiil.

It would hurt, seeing him for the last time, more than it hurt being showered with gifts and not having the courage to touch him.

* * *

It came without warning or fanfare. As usual, Astia was summoned to the Basilica, expecting the embarrassment of another gift and the firm tug that her newfound longing caused her anytime she thought of or saw Sotha Sil.

There was no gift.

"I can send you back."

For a moment, Astia looked at the sorcerer without a word, torn between relief and sadness, caught unprepared for the last time she'd see him.

"Your silence is surprising." Sotha Sil turned towards her from his workstation. "I thought you'd be pleased."

"I am." The vestige did her best to look anywhere but at him, worried her expression would betray her.

"When?" she asked eventually.

"Ah, about that." Astia could hear a chair scraping the metal floor and then footsteps as Sotha Sil approached her. "As soon as you tell me what it is that you want for yourself."

Astia looked up, trying to come up with an answer that would feel convincing, and failing. Neramo was right – she was a bad liar.

"I want to know, before you leave." said Sotha Sil calmly.

"Why?" asked Astia. "It's enough for you to send me back. There's nothing else."

"You need to learn a measure of selfishness if you are to succeed, Astia." he replied, "Now, tell me."

Astia lowered her gaze.

"I cannot." she said quietly.

"So there is something. Name it."

The vestige refused to answer, feeling backed into a corner and seeing no escape from the situation.

"What if I were to tell you I won't send you back until you reveal what it is?"

Astia's head snapped up.

"You wouldn't."

Sotha Sil's fathomless eyes bore deep into hers, an unreadable expression on his face.

"You would hold me here, knowing my homeland is burning, delaying me to satisfy your curiosity?" asked Astia disbelievingly.

"Unlike you, I have learned how to be selfish long ago. It is an unpleasant, but necessary lesson." replied Sotha Sil, "Selflessness will get you killed before your time, Astia.

"It will eat at you." he continued, voice trailing away, eyes losing focus. "It will gnaw at you, and your restlessness will never grant you peace or happiness.

"So yes, I will insist." he looked at her again. "I promised to protect you, and this is another way I am choosing to do that, even if you hate me."

"Hate you?" Astia's fingers twitched; she didn't realise her hand was clenching and unclenching without conscious thought. "I can never hate you."

The vestige wasn't sure if Sotha Sil was being truthful when he threatened to keep her in the Clockwork City until she revealed her wish and yet knew that there was no hiding from his scrutiny now that he knew there was something she wanted, that he'd find out eventually by himself. That he would feel disgusted, and send her away as fast as he could.

"It's you, Sil." she said eventually, disliking how her voice shook. "You are what I want for myself."

She raised her head and looked back at him, her face softening from defiance to tenderness, scared of what his reaction would be, but also liberated. Sotha Sil's eyes widened and his posture suddenly grew more rigid – he was used to being alone, and thus he was unguarded, leaving Astia stunned. She closed the gap between them, head craned at an uncomfortable angle so she could maintain eye contact as she gathered the courage she wished she'd had before.

"Now you know." Her hand splayed on the sorcerer's tunic, as she marveled at both her own audacity and the warmth of his skin underneath the white fabric.

"I know I cannot have you." Astia's fingers tightened on the coarse material, and then slowly let go. "I know I must seem foolish. I probably am. It was embarrassing enough to admit it. Now send me home and forget."

Sotha Sil's expression was now unreadable as he remained silent for what seemed minutes.

"I have never considered you foolish, Astia. But it is not wise to cherish one such as me." He said eventually. "Not like this."

"Maybe." replied Astia. "Probably. But it is what it is."

"Why me?" Metallic fingers lifted her chin to make her look up again. "I am not capable of returning your feelings. Not how you'd want me to."

Astia looked at him for a moment, haunted by the memory of the words spoken by another woman, centuries before, trapped and endlessly repeated among wayward stars.

"I never have, nor will ask you to." She said with a faint smile. "Let's not drag this out. Send me back to Cyrodiil."

It seemed that her request went unnoticed, or ignored.

"I don't belong only to myself. Not anymore." said Sotha Sil, a pensive note in his tone. "And as such, I am no longer free to give myself to anyone, even if I wanted to."

It stung, but Astia told herself she knew that was to be expected.

"I understand. I did not expect anything different. In my mind, I created enough memories to cherish."

She dared to rest her forehead against the sorcerer's chest, enjoying the brief moment of closeness and soon was taken by surprise by a delicate touch on her hair.

"Two days." Sotha Sil's voice was unusually muted, barely audible. "To create real memories. This is what I can give."

Astia looked up at him, shocked, unsure how to react.

"I would appreciate an answer." he said as the vestige's body was lifted off the ground until they were face to face.

Astia stared into his unreadable eyes, weighing her options.

"No." she replied eventually.

"Why is that?" Sotha Sil's head cocked to one side. "Isn't it better to have a fragment of what one wants, if they cannot have it all?"

"I don't want it. Not like this." The vestige elaborated. "Luciana warned me… I should've listened. I never wanted to tell you, but you pushed me to give you my answer. Just send me home. That will be sufficient of a prize. And whenever Neramo, Kireth and Raynor want to go back to Tamriel, send them back too."

Sotha Sil raised his arms and the vestige could see his right hand was covered by a glove, obscuring the usual glimmer of brass. He took it off, and she gasped, seeing dark flesh where the mechanical palm used to be.

"Even centuries ago, before my transformation, I had always been distant. And now I am here, on this plane, but my awareness spreads past it. All empirical evidence points at me not being capable of what you'd like me to be. Likely I never have been."

"Your hand. How…?"

"Did you think it beyond my powers to recreate what I willingly parted with?"

"Why would you do that?"

"I was… curious." The hesitant note in Sotha Sil's voice seemed out of place. "Ever since you touched me. I had forgotten, just like you said.

"Who was it that had touched me last, before you did?" he mused, as his hand rose towards Astia's face. "Was it Nerevar? Was it Vivec, or someone else?"

Sotha Sil's fingers brushed her cheek, and then cupped it, featherlike, as though he wasn't sure how to use them. Against her better judgement, Astia leaned into the touch, pressing her face against the sorcerer's palm.

"Your skin is warm." he said. "You are scared of touch, but you lean into mine. I find it pleasing."

It was as he said, ever since the first time he lay a comforting hand on her shoulder in the Elegiac Replication, Astia had known he wouldn't hurt her. She tried to determine when the lack of fear whenever Sotha Sil touched her molded into the need to be touched again, though only by him. They kept looking at each other, no words spoken, as though both were struggling to find the right ones.

"I don't have much to give you." Sotha Sil was the first to break the silence that settled over them. "But what little mortality I have left in me, you can have. You have given me much, it is only fair I reciprocate in kind."

"I don't know what to say." Astia whispered in response.

"You need not say anything. All you need to do is think, just like before. Show me."

Before she could stop herself, Astia's mind was flooded with images and feelings.

"You've already accepted." commented Sotha Sil. "You think that after the time I offered you will never see me again. You want good memories, before you plunge yourself into blood and death once more. You want something to go back to, to keep you sane when the thoughts of the ones you've killed and sacrificed for the sake of many keep you awake."

"Yes, this is what I want." said the vestige quietly, feeling raw and open.

"Your desires already shaped to fill the vessel of that short time, much like water." he continued. "There is a place you want to show me and share with me; the first place that feels like home after the one you've lost. You want me to see real stars shining through the leaves. You want to stand with me atop a hill, hold my hand and watch those leaves swirl in gusts of wind that carry songs of bards as fires flicker in the distance."

The dual voice seemed hypnotic, and Astia felt as though her thoughts were coming alive underneath her eyelids as he spoke.

"You want me to sit with you by the fire and you wish to rest your head against my shoulder. You feel I am beyond tired, and you want me to lay my head in your lap as you hum and watch me fall asleep. You want me to hold you so for a short while you can feel safe. You want to be touched in a way that soothes, not hurts. You are afraid of being touched, but you want me to touch you."

"Oh." He sounded mildly surprised, as though he stumbled upon something he did not expect, and the vestige understood that she had been careless and let him see something he wasn't supposed to. She froze, panicked, but Sotha Sil leaned into her, his lips now close to Astia's ear, almost touching.

"You don't want me to stop." he whispered. "You want me inside of you."

A shiver ran down Astia's spine as he calmly voiced what she'd been trying to hide, and she felt heat rise in her cheeks. Two arms, flesh and brass, gathered her closer.

"You need not feel ashamed."

"But you don't see me this way." she tried.

"I promised to protect you, not judge you." he replied. "I have insisted that you reveal what you wanted; how could I fault you when you finally did? You don't want anything from me, you want… me. It chips away at the certainty that dooms me. I need to analyse it more, but I don't find it displeasing."

Sotha Sil's right hand, the newly restored flesh, cupped Astia's cheek again, then moved down her neck and traced her collarbone. She couldn't supress a shiver and he noticed, a spark in his eye that she already recognised. Curiosity.

"Seeing you like this pleases me."

"I accept then." said the vestige quietly.

"Good." Sotha Sil nodded and his arms tightened their hold on Astia. "Hold on to me, and think of the place you now call home."


	10. Chapter 10

**The Space between Us**

The feeling of being pushed through space was just as unpleasant as the first time she'd experienced it. Astia clung to Sotha Sil and that was the only reason she didn't stumble when their journey was over. She opened her eyes to darkness – it must've been night in Tamriel when they arrived; she looked up, trying to make out the sorcerer's features in the dark.

Before she had any time to think, the darkness subsided – the hearth and lanterns she kept in the house all lit up, bathing Sotha Sil's face in a delicate, soft glow and Astia realised that it was the first time she'd seen him in natural light. The flickering of flames made him look younger, as though it was drawing out his mortal side. She touched his face and almost immediately took her hand away.

She stepped out of his embrace, unsure how to act. It felt as though she wanted too much all at once, and didn't know how to ask for it.

"You may." Sotha Sil's calm voice betrayed no emotion. "I don't mind."

 _Nor do you care._

The thought came unbidden before Astia remembered her mind was still opened to him. If he heard it, he chose not to comment.

Astia took his hand in hers just like she wanted to before he told her she could, that he didn't mind. It took a moment before his fingers entwined with hers, his reactions slow, whether because he was unaccustomed to touch or because he didn't care enough, she didn't know.

All of a sudden, Astia wasn't sure she could do this, feeling as if she were a dog, waiting for scraps thrown by a hand of a capricious master and the next moment realising that she was desperate enough to accept it.

"Welcome to my home." she said, her voice shaking more than she'd like. "I know it's not much…"

"It's a good place to call home."

Sil was looking around the house's only chamber and Astia stepped away again. He walked around the room, fingers of his restored hand brushing against the wooden walls and the carvings on beams, at times pausing to trace more intricate patterns. He looked out of place and Astia smiled for the first time that night.

"You seem too tall for this space."

Sotha Sil sat down on the bed.

"Is that more acceptable?"

"I was jesting." Astia walked towards the bed and then stood in front of him, unsure how to behave.

"You don't know how happy I am to share this space with you." she said, "Ah. But you know, don't you?"

"I did little to deserve such kindness."

"Don't say that." It was strange to look at him from this angle as she said the words. "I have never met anyone more worthy of kindness than you."

"You are mistaken." For a moment, Sil's face showed the same anguish as in the Mnemonic Planisphere, before it was covered by his usual, stoic expression.

"I know I'm not."

Having said that, Astia stepped closer to Sotha Sil and pulled him towards her, suppressing a shiver when she felt his mouth brush against her collarbone as he settled into her embrace. She ran her fingers through his hair and held him, hoping her hands could express her feelings better than words she seemed to struggle with in his presence.

Sotha Sil's arms locked around her waist in a gentler version of his embrace from the Mnemonic Planisphere.

"This is… difficult to analyse." he murmured against her skin before moving away.

"I thought it was supposed to be me comforting you, not the other way round." he added, looking up at her.

Without much further thought, Astia took his face in her hands and leaned towards him. She brushed her lips against his, first delicately, then more firmly, immediately hurt when her actions were not reciprocated, and moved away at arm's length, ashamed.

"I'm sorry." she whispered. "I wasn't thinking…"

"Do it again." Sotha Sil interrupted her.

Astia looked at him disbelievingly.

"Do it again."

Astia leaned in, and this time met with an immediate response; Sotha Sil's lips moved against hers, dry and chapped, mimicking her movements. Wondering how much she was allowed, she tangled her fingers in his hair and tilted his head; his eyes remained open, unnerving, as if cataloguing her actions.

She eventually backed away, her breathing ragged, looking at the sorcerer apprehensively, as though only know it hit her what she has done.

"Do not be wary of me." he said, "I was the one who insisted for you to be more selfish. Be selfish, Astia."

The vestige didn't reply, but instead pushed him on the bed, but since one of Sotha Sil's hands was still wrapped around her waist, they fell together in an awkward tangle of limbs, her landing heavily on top of him.

"I have forgotten." Sotha Sil eyed her carefully. "You made me remember in the Mnemonic Planisphere and I know that I am inadequate to give you what you need."

Astia kissed him again, and this time deepened the kiss, tangling her fingers in his hair. She kissed his jawline and neck, surprised by the need she felt, worried she was going to be swept away, her mind too clouded to commit every moment they had to memory. He let her do as she pleased, but his hands around her waist remained motionless.

She tried to calm down her breathing, staring at him from almost no distance, noticing the flecks of darker red in his irises she hadn't paid attention to before.

"I don't think either of us is ready to be any closer." she managed, feeling a trace of shame again, almost as if she forced her affections on him.

"You didn't." he reassured her, "I may not be capable of giving you what you need, but I am not unwilling."

Astia lay down next to Sotha Sil, her hand clutching his tunic, feeling content when he wrapped his arm around her to hold her closer.

"It feels unusual." he said.

"What does?"

"Being wanted like this." Astia's cheeks flared up, but Sotha Sil's tone remained unchanged. "Though I find it strange to have that hunger directed at me, I don't find it unpleasant."

Astia told herself that it was as good as it got and tried relaxing, but couldn't help looking past the two days he'd gifted her with, scared of what would come next.

"Don't think of it now. There's no place for fear in the space between us."

Astia tightened her hold on Sil, doing her best to extinguish the space separating them to nothing and slowly calmed down, lulled into sleep by the whirring of his mechanical heart. As her breathing became slow and deep, he flicked his wrist and the flames in the hearth and lanterns went out. He didn't need the gesture, but he supposed even he wasn't completely immune to theatrics.

He gazed into the dark for a long time after Astia had fallen asleep, not feeling the need to rest himself, carefully analysing the bizarre situation he know found himself in, his equations tangling in loops and bringing more questions than answers.

* * *

Astia looked up at Sil hesitantly.

When she first woke up, she felt contentment at having him so close, but it quickly morphed into awkwardness and silence borne of uncertainty – she wasn't sure how to show her affections, and he – how to return them.

Standing on the doorstep of the Dwemer ruin of Mzulft, Astia felt the day was developing into another unexpected turn. The clouds above them seemed unmoving, as though painted over the pastel paleness of the morning sky.

She was grateful that Sil chose to walk, sparing her another spatial travel. When she bought the abandoned logging camp from Thulvald Axe-Head to make it her home, it was not for the vicinity of a Dwemer ruin, but for the remoteness of the place. After too close of an encounter with trolls and spriggans at the camp, Thulvald was all too happy to sell. Astia's closest neighbours were the royal workers at the settlement of Cragwallow who kept the place clean and secure in her absence, grateful for the help she had given them in the past. Jorunn's stand, the other closest settlement, has now emptied out, and even the trolls and spriggans were long gone, gifting the vestige with the loneliness that she didn't need, but felt she deserved.

It was a beautiful place that reminded her of Bruma from happier days, and she loved it fiercely, with a tenderness mixed with grief. The closeness of mountains, the forests, the way sunlight filtered through the branches and glided over the rocky ridges tugged at her heart and made her smile in fondness. She was glad to show her new home to Sil, baffled by why he insisted on walking to the nearby ruin of Mzulft. Her hand closed around the hilt of her sword, knowing what they could expect inside.

"They are missing something, and they can never understand what it is, for their masters conditioned them into obedience, and then disappeared." Sotha Sil said, sensing her thoughts without reading them. "To continue one's existence, forever lacking something and never being able to discern the source of one's longing – what a pitiful existence."

His hand closed over hers, and then gently moved it off the sword hilt.

"It won't be necessary." he said, and pushed the heavy door open.

Astia trusted him, but still felt tense as they entered the ruin and she smelled the familiar scent of dust and dwarven oil. The mechanisms built centuries before still whirred in puffs of steam, unerring in their dedication to tasks that would never again be checked.

To her surprise, the dwarven spiders inside didn't attack them, instead opting to follow them to the first big chamber. Sotha Sil stopped in the middle, his mechanical hand heavy on Astia's shoulder. The automatons swarmed around them, crawling from every corridor, as if they all were trying to get closer to them. It felt strange to Astia, but all of a sudden they gained a semblance of almost-living in her eyes, as though they were children flocking to a parent who's been gone for too long.

They built an impenetrable circle around the two of them, their soul gems flickering in the dimmed light of the ruin, joints whirring uncertainly, unused to pausing in the perpetual cycle of motion they had been programmed to.

"I am not your master." said Sil. "I pity you, but I will not command you. Leave."

"Leave." he repeated, his tone somber.

The automatons slowly dispersed and Astia was surprised both by their readiness to obey Sotha Sil and her sadness at their fate she'd never given thought to.

"Why are we here?" she asked quietly.

"There is something here I wanted to show you."

Astia paused, her brow furrowed. She had been in Mzulft before, fought her way through it and couldn't think what could it be that he wanted her to see.

"Do not stray from my side, Astia." said Sotha Sil, his hand locking over her shoulder and pulling her along.

"I can protect myself." she protested.

"I wish you wouldn't have to." he replied. "And this is not why I wanted you to be here today."

He was being cryptic as usual, and she chose not to ask, letting him lead her through the dark tunnels until they stopped in front of what looked like solid rock. Sil put his hand against the stone; the familiar orange glow illuminated the hallway briefly, and then the wall parted, revealing a dark chamber.

Sotha Sil pulled Astia inside and she didn't protest, too shocked to see a place that she never suspected had existed. It lit up as though responding to Sotha Sil's presence, bathing them both in a yellowish light of dwarven lamps.

The chamber was huge, its ceiling covered in shadows despite the numerous lamps. Astia looked around curiously until she noticed a shape that seemed familiar.

"I have seen something like this before, in Vvardenfell." she said, taking in the levers, valves and muted red lights. "It is a tonal resonator."

"It is."

"Why would you want me to see this?" she looked up, but found Sotha Sil's expression as inscrutable as always. "A friend of mine, a wizard, theorised that the Dwemer used devices like this one for mind control."

"True." replied Sotha Sil, "That is but one of potential uses for a tonal resonator, but the use I wanted you to experience is far more mundane."

He lifted his hand and the resonator's mechanism clicked loudly and then whirred. Astia opened her mouth to ask something, but quickly forgot what it was, stunned by the sound building up in the empty chamber.

It was merely air and moving, mechanical parts, she told herself as the melody filled the chamber. It opened with a flourish, almost as though a ghostly musician had been waiting in the dark for centuries, fingers suspended above the mechanism, ready to play as soon as the light hit them.

The rolling chords briefly reminded Astia of a harp she'd sometimes hear at the Imperial court, but their tone was deeper, encompassing. It descended on her like lightning, washing over her in the warmth of a summer rain. The raw melody unleashed in the chamber tugged at Astia until she felt tears streaming down her face as she succumbed to primal beauty she never expected to find in a place like this.

"Come." She was surprised when Sotha Sil gathered her closer to him and gasped when they started floating. She blinked the tears away and saw they were face to face, floating in a bubble of magicka in the dark air, as if suspended by the melody that kept weaving its way around them.

"Come." he repeated, holding her even closer. Her cheek rested against his shoulder and she wrapped her arms around him, only now remembering to return his embrace.

Astia didn't know what it was – his closeness, the dimmed light or the music weaved by a long forgotten mechanism, but she found herself clinging to Sotha Sil, wishing they could remain suspended forever.

"I'm scared." she admitted, "I love my homeland, but I don't want to go back and fight. I feel despicable."

"You're not. No hero asks for the hand they are dealt – all they can do is try to make the best of it and stay sane."

"I'm not…" Astia's voice shook. "I'm not sure I'm strong enough."

"Only foolish ones do." Sotha Sil's fingers tangled in her hair, halting uncertainly from time to time as he stroke her hair. "You are not foolish, Astia."

"I have trust in you." he added, "But I wish you have given your affections to one more deserving. I do not wish to add to your burdens."

"Don't say that." she replied, ashamed of her pleading tone. "I don't regret it."

"Astia..."

"Please." she interrupted him, "Don't say anything. Let us stay like this, for a while."

"As you wish."

Astia tightened her hold on Sil, but then slowly relaxed, striving to find peace in the haunting, forlorn melody and the sound of his breathing.


	11. Chapter 11

**Hold**

"It has been a long time since I last enjoyed the sun." Sil's tone was pensive as he looked up, shielding his eyes upon leaving the dimness of Mzulf for the brightness of early Eastmarch afternoon.

"I like it." said Astia, squeezing his hand and smiling when met with an inquisitive glance. "It makes you look young… Younger?" she corrected herself quickly.

"Is that so?" a small smile tugged at Sotha Sil's lips.

A loud cawing could be heard before Astia had a chance to formulate a reply, and Bone flew towards them. Normally he would settle on her shoulder, but this time the crow seemed agitated and kept cawing as it floated in front of her, unnaturally still in the air despite the wind.

"Did something happen, Bone?"

The crow cawed again and set towards the west; Astia briefly glanced at Sil and followed the bird into the line of trees, towards her home. She soon came to a small clearing and gasped at the sight that welcomed her. The grass was soaked in blood around two motionless figures – a Nord whose hand was stretched towards a broken bow that fell a few feet from him amongst the rusted blades of grass, his armor torn, and a huge black bear with a large wound in its side, a sword still inside.

The gruesome scene must've happened when she was inside the ruins with Sil; otherwise they would've heard something earlier that day, so close to her home it was.

Astia went to the man first, checked his pulse and shook her head sadly. She then walked towards the animal he killed before passing away and strained to remove the sword from its side. She was startled when the bear growled quietly.

She knelt down next to its head; one eye opened and looked back at her, its amber colour eerily similar to her own eyes, regarding her with an almost human-like expression of an intelligence that understood it was too late.

"It's going to die." she heard Sotha Sil's voice from behind her.

Astia didn't understand why a dying bear affected her so much; but it was as though her hate of blood and death manifested itself, glistening in the ruby red, nestled in the black fur.

"It doesn't have to. You can save it."

"Why?" asked Sotha Sil, "It killed that hunter, didn't it?"

"Please, Sil."

Astia looked at the sorcerer imploringly. His hair was blowing in the wind, a sight she had never witnessed before; he looked at her calmly, as though nothing could shake him, as though the display of emotion she witnessed days before was a figment of her imagination.

"Very well." Sotha Sil said eventually and knelt next to her in the bloodied grass; he lay his hand on the bear's side. As his palm emitted a familiar orange glow, Astia touched the bear's head and stroked the dark fur as one amber eye kept observing her.

"You'll be fine." she whispered, "He is… he is the best healer I know. There's nothing he cannot fix."

Sil's hand stilled and shook for a brief moment before resuming its slow motion over the animal's wound, until it closed completely as though it had never existed in the first place.

The bear staggered as it got up. It looked at her again, and then left unhurriedly towards the line of trees. Astia watched it go and then started inspecting the sword. To her dismay, it had no name engraved on it. Many Nords she has come to know during her time with the Pact named their blades, but she could find no such clue. She looked through a satchel she found nearby, but found no letters, maps or anything else that could give her an idea of the man's identity.

"Someone out there will wait for him, but he will never come home." she said, her throat tight all of a sudden.

Minutes passed as she felt frozen in place, the dead, nameless man taking on the appearance of her brother in her mind's eye.

"Astia." Sotha Sil lay a hand on her shoulder. "Give me a moment."

"What…" she didn't finish the question; Sotha Sil and the dead Nord were gone and she found she was standing alone on the bloodied clearing.

She waited as minutes stretched, fear creeping up on her. What if Sil wouldn't be back? They still had more time together that they had agreed upon, but what if he had grown tired of her already?

"I have not."

Just like that, he was back.

"Where did you go?"

"Hall of the Dead in Windhelm." he explained. "The priest will look for his family."

"How…?"

"As far as the priest is concerned, a travelling merchant found the body and brought it to the Hall. Whoever this man was, he will be well taken care of."

Astia's throat tightened as she fought to keep her brother's ghost away from the silent clearing, from the memories she was hoping to build in the brief stretch of time she had with Sotha Sil, trying to close them off from the outside, just him and her, as if they were inside a miniature world of their own making, like a snow globe she remembered admiring many times in her father's study when she was little.

"Thank you." she managed.

Sil took a deep breath and it was a moment before Astia noticed that all the blood was gone – the clearing looked as it had never been disturbed. That didn't surprise her, but what did was Sil's slow walk to a lone pine tree in the middle of the clearing. He sat down, his back against the trunk, and rested his head against it too. He looked sad and weary.

Astia walked towards him and stopped in front of him.

"You are wrong." he said. "I cannot fix everything. I couldn't."

She understood immediately what he spoke of and sank onto the grass next to him, awaiting his next words, wondering if he'd choose to say anything at all.

"I resolved I would ask his forgiveness after the battle ended. Instead of using my newfound powers to thwart Kagrenac, I should have gone back and used them to heal Nerevar."

Sotha Sil looked in the distance.

"In truth, I was a coward. I didn't have enough courage to face him; I sought to protect our people, to win as though it would make it all better, as though he'd forgive me if my deeds were great enough to justify my betrayal."

He turned to look at Astia.

"I defied someone I loved and failed to save him. By the time the dust settled, he was gone. I was too late."

"No, Sil, no…" Astia took a firm hold of his shoulders. "How many more would have died if you had not protected them? How would you live with yourself knowing you failed them, those hundreds or thousands that would've died without you getting your powers?"

"But he was more important, to me."

"I know. But you would still have made the same choice."

Sotha Sil nodded.

"You are right, I would have. Gods forgive me, for I will not forgive myself for as long as I live."

The look he gave her was so full of sorrow it broke her heart.

"The Ashlanders are right, Astia." he added quietly, "I am the worst kind of traitor. And he died alone, knowing that I betrayed his trust."

"No, you are not a traitor." said Astia with a decisive shake of her head. "Listen. Feel."

She was straddling him now, her forehead pressed against his, one of her hands cupping his cheek as the other locked on his shoulder.

"Let me in. See for yourself how I see you." she added in a whisper, closing her eyes to help empty her mind and concentrate on feeling.

Astia was not sure how opening one's mind worked, but was intent on projecting her feelings right at Sotha Sil, knowing it was likely her only chance at expressing them fully where words failed her. She squeezed her eyes shut in concentration, thinking of what and how she felt for him.

His mind was beautiful, a complex maze of hundreds of years of knowledge, burning with a brilliance both dazzling and awe inspiring.

She felt for him, knowing what it meant to sacrifice a friend, imagining Lyris' face and her serene smile as she argued her case, asking to be killed for the good of many. It hurt and she could only imagine how Sil's guilt must've grown through so many years, grateful she wouldn't have to endure similar fate.

She wished she could take his pain away, help his anguish, relieve his loneliness. She wanted to shield him, protect him, keep him safe, no matter how powerful he was.

He was the only one she trusted implicitly, the only one who made her feel safe. If she had years to fully discover him, she gladly would, and would never feel tired of him; she only had mere days, but didn't feel resentful. No, she was grateful.

Sil's pain and withdrawal from life resonated with her; she felt for him but would never want to change him. He was selfless, regardless of what he'd said several times trying to convince her he was anything but. No one else she knew had his conviction, his love for all of Tamriel – those who revered him, those who knew nothing of him, those who resented him. He walked through Coldharbour to protect them all, and locked himself away to continue keeping them safe.

Maybe he didn't love her, but he knew how to love; he knew more about love than the other two Tribunes and she felt the level of admiration and respect for him that the other two would never command.

She enjoyed the unusual way he chose to express himself when he spoke – both unnerving and endearing; she loved his strangeness, silence and the way he held her – unsure, sometimes too strong, sometimes too weak.

To her, he was the epitome of kindness and love – and she couldn't help but love him, more than she'd ever loved anyone else. She wished she could diminish the profound sadness she felt in him.

He would live far longer than she would, and it was likely that in the centuries to come her memory would fade away. It was fine. But as brief as her life was compared to his, she wouldn't forget him. Even when parted from him, she would still love him and wish him well, for she's never met anyone more deserving of love. She felt lucky she got to know him and be with him the way she could. She wouldn't ask for more.

At first it didn't register, the warm pressure against her lips, and it took Astia a moment to understand that Sil was kissing her, and that she failed to respond, just like he did the first time, but it didn't take her long to drown in the feel of him, disappointed when he moved away. He gave her a quizzical look, his mouth barely open as though he wanted to say something, but in the end he leaned back towards her and kissed her again.

When their lips finally parted, the words spilled out of Astia before she could think.

"More. I want more."

Sil regarded her with an absent expression, but eventually nodded and the he waited no more, rising from the ground and taking her with him effortlessly. He was holding her close to him, forgetting how much taller he was; Astia's feet were dangling high above the ground and she smiled at him, eyes shining with warmth.

"Put me down."

"Oh. I'm sorry." he said absentmindedly, and lowered her to the ground.

Astia took his hand in hers and squeezed tightly.

"Let's go home," she said, and set towards her cabin, Bone flying high above their heads.

They walked hand in hand, as though they've done it many times before, as though the simple gesture bound them and stretched into the future they didn't have. When they reached the house, Astia started up the stairs, but Sotha Sil held her back.

"A moment." he said. He closed his eyes and the air around them shone and then dimmed.

"What did you do?" asked Astia curiously.

"No more unwanted guests."

Astia looked at him, and then threw her arms around him and buried her face in his tunic.

"No one will be able to come near unless you want them to. Not even me." Heavy, brass fingers cupped her head and tangled in her hair in a caress that seemed awkward, but soon turned into soothing.

Astia looked up at him and reached up, trying to touch his face. He smiled briefly and leaned towards her, his back bent at what looked like an uncomfortable angle. She kissed him, again pouring all her feelings at him. It still felt clumsy and rushed, the intimacy of two people unused to closeness, yet to her it was perfect.

Minutes later when she finally led him into the house, it was her turn to pause.

"I always want you to come near." she said.

She was looking at him with a serious expression, realising the futility of her words as soon as she'd said them for she understood she'd never see him again, but at the same time couldn't help but tell him anyway.

"My home is your home."

* * *

"Close your eyes."

Astia did as instructed.

"Open."

"I… I can't say I'm even surprised anymore." she said, watching the heavy wooden table in front of the fire place.

"I can go without sustenance for a long time, but you should eat something."

"I forgot," admitted Astia, only now realising she'd gone a very long time without food. The table hosted much of what she liked to eat, in happier times when she'd enjoy food along with more pleasures that her new life made her forget among the clash of weapons and scars.

"Come," she said, "Perhaps we can enjoy it together?"

Sil nodded and they both sat down. At first Astia just observed him between the sips of heavy, imperial wine, startled by the discovery that she'd never seen him eat before, but soon she started enjoying their shared meal, wondering how it was possible that a slice of raisin cake pushed her even farther into the hopeless love she felt for him.

* * *

"You're spoiling me." Astia said as the remainder of their meal disappeared without her needing to do anything.

"Hardly." She was attempting to joke, but Sil's forlorn expression made it clear it went unnoticed.

She got up and walked towards him. Like the evening before, she gathered him close and held him.

"You wanted more." Sil said, his voice slightly muffled as his mouth brushed against Astia's skin when he spoke. "Do you still wish for it?"

Astia let go of him and stepped away, but he spoke before the embarrassment set in.

"No need to be ashamed. Not with me." he reassured her, "And it is fine to admit what you want."

Sil looked at her, his gaze calm, almost serene, and Astia took a deep breath before deciding to have actions speak when she seemed unable to. She felt bare even before she shed her clothes. Her hands shook slightly as she took off piece by piece, too self-conscious to maintain eye contact. She felt his gaze on her, and eventually raised her head so she could look back at him, making a conscious effort not to wrap her arms around herself to hide.

"Would you like me to touch you?" Sil's voice held a tinge of something that seemed close to care, to careful attention.

Astia nodded slowly.

"Yes, but…" she hesitated, feeling heat rise in her cheeks. "I want to see you. All of you."

"Right." He seemed hesitant for a second, but almost immediately nodded. "Very well."

As Sil walked towards her from the other side of the house's only room, it seemed as though his robes fell apart at the seams on their own, trickling down his body like water to pool at the wooden floor as he shed them and left them behind with every step, until he stood in front of her, hair falling over a now naked shoulder; to Astia he felt both otherworldly and beautiful.

"I've never paid much attention to how I looked like, neither have I ever considered myself… what you think of me." His ever calm voice made her realise she'd said the last word aloud, yet she didn't feel ashamed.

"I think you are beautiful, in many ways." Astia replied, "In many layers. To me, this is true beauty. Accept it."

As she said that, she let her eyes roam the bare expanse of skin, noticing the seamless way the brass arm melded into flesh, feeling her hunger build the longer she looked. She thought she'd be afraid to be bare for another to see and touch, that she'd be afraid to join with him, but she wasn't. Underneath the longing, she could feel arousal stir, a forgotten feeling, pushed aside during the long months of fighting, followed by disappointment that he didn't seem to share her want.

"You need not be afraid of me." Said Sil, his voice soothing. "I will do as much, or as little as you wish me to.

"I don't have to touch you to give you pleasure." he added, and Astia felt the delicate sparks of his magicka wash over her skin in a sensation that made her bite her lip.

"No." she shook her head. "I want you to, I just…" She wasn't sure how to express herself.

Sil's magic lifted her off the ground so they were face to face again. He opened his arms, waiting, and when she nodded, he pulled her in an embrace that was strong, but not forceful. Her legs wrapped around his hips as she lay her head on his shoulder and embraced him in return; she was pressed against him in a way that felt extremely intimate, yet not sexual.

"You are safe with me." he said.

Astia nodded, enjoying the feel of his skin and coarse hair against her cheek. Sil smelled of warm brass and oil, a scent she's come to associate with comfort, with absence of pain. For the first time in many months she was feeling warm, safe. Accepted. She basked in the feeling after being deprived of it after the Soulburst, and she enjoyed the mixed sensation of being supported and touched by an artificial hand, and the flesh one. Again, she wished for so many things at once, unsure how to express her feelings.

"It is fine to say it aloud." Sil said.

"I wish you were mine." replied Astia, stumbling over the truth in her words.

"Even though inadequate, I am. As much as I can be."

"I want all of you."

She could feel slight vibration and heard delicate whirring as he murmured in assent, a wordless, soothing sound as his hand moved up and down her back in a slow caress.

"Are you sure?" The vestige said as she leaned back to look at him.

Sil seemed amused, his thin mouth curved in a delicate smile.

"You have seen me defy a daedric prince, heal mortal wounds and connect you with the dead. Yet now you seem to think I don't know what I'm doing."

"My mind may have forgotten, but my body remembers." He added, and leaned in close to whisper in her ear. "And so will yours. It will remember me, won't it?"

Astia nodded, unable to speak – first because of emotion, then because Sil's magic crept all over her skin again, making her moan in response.

"It is pleasing to watch you react to my touch this way." Sil's voice remained calm as his fingers touched the base of Astia's skull and traveled down her spine, emitting sparks of magicka that ignited nerve endings she had never been aware of.

"I strive for optimal results in whatever I put my mind to." His fingers went back up Astia's back and her body arched in his hold. For a brief moment, Sil's words made her feel as though she was another experiment of his, but she was past caring, realizing how starved she was for touch that brought not pain, but pleasure.

The brass hand closed around one of her breasts, and all of a sudden Astia panicked, her body rigid. She had seen this hand bend metal, and it hit her again just how broken she was, if even his touch could scare her.

"Do you want me to stop?" Astia opened her eyes and met with only calm and patience. Just as fast as her fear appeared, it dissipated. She shook her head.

Sil gathered her closer, his lips now brushing Astia's ear as his fingers and magicka resumed their trek over her body.

"You are not broken." he said. "You may be imperfect, but you are a beautiful mechanism."

"I enjoy discovering how it works." he added, this time louder, eliciting another moan.

"It is not just my touch you respond to." There was a hint of interest in his voice as he catalogued her reactions. "It is my voice as well."

"I wonder… do you wish me to talk when I am inside you?" Even though she realised he only said the words to confirm he was correct, Astia couldn't help a pleasant shiver.

"Maybe." she replied, her finger tracing his thin lips, and she was no longer ashamed. "All I know now is how much I want you."

It looked like words did not only affect her. Sil carried her across the room until she felt her back press against the wall.

"Are you sure?" he asked.

"Yes."

One of his hands traveled between their bodies and soon Astia could feel him press against her.

"Let me in." he said, and she nodded her assent.

Astia felt her mind snap and then melt as warmth of another consciousness melded with her own. She gasped loudly when Sil entered her; she, they - could feel everything; holding and being held, taking and being taken; magicka sparked all around their joined bodies as they gasped and breathed with two pairs of lungs, shivering in both skins at once, lifted off the ground by a spell weaved by both and one, floating in the air like dovah-flies, an equation stretched into seconds, minutes, hours, movements harmonised and seamless, a perfect mechanism finally screaming out in a bizarre, beautiful melody of three voices.


	12. Chapter 12

**Worlds Apart**

Astia's fingers combed through Sotha Sil's hair, enjoying the coarseness that made her feel real, grounded. His head was resting in her lap, his tall figure stretched in the grass as he looked up at her.

"Tell me." he said.

"You always know, don't you?" Astia's fingertips brushed over his forehead and nose and traced his lips and neck. She was still surprised by the intimacy he allowed, although she couldn't help but wonder if he even enjoyed it.

"I do." Brass fingers closed around hers, bringing her hand to rest on his chest and holding it there. "Now tell me."

"I was thinking of my home." she admitted. "Not the Capital… I was thinking of travelling north through the grasslands of Nibenay valley, poppies and thistle bowing their heads in the spring breeze."

She paused, gripped by both fondness and longing.

"Tell me more." Sotha Sil released her hand and rolled to rest on his side, his face now buried in the soft linen of Astia's tunic, brass arm snaking around her waist.

"The grasslands gradually give way to harsher land, green to snow, sun to cloud." Astia continued, still caressing his hair. "Jagged peaks reach towards grey skies, glittering like silver, cold and beautiful like the chill on an early morning when you think all of the world is asleep under the cover of snow and it's just you and the mountains, timeless, endlessly patient."

"I have not been to these parts of Cyrodiil for many years." replied Sotha Sil, his voice barely audible. "It sounds like a good place to call home."

"It is." Astia felt tears coming, and took a deep breath to calm herself. "I wish you could see it."

"I barely remember my home." said Sil and fell silent. Astia waited, unsure if he would continue, but kept stroking his hair, hoping it felt soothing.

"I never went back." he admitted, "Not once after it had been destroyed. Even now, after so many years, I am hesitant to do it."

"I wish I had the power to give it back to you." said Astia quietly when he chose not to share anything more.

"I know." Sotha Sil rose, sat next to her and leaned to touch his forehead to hers. "I am grateful you feel this way."

Astia reached towards him and held his head in place, enjoying his closeness.

"You are my home, Sil." she said quietly. "Even when we part and even though I will never see you again, I will take comfort in it. Perhaps I am not your home, but… I am always on your side."

As soon as she said that, Sil gathered her closer and held her in silence. As she returned his embrace, Astia gasped. All around them, what mere seconds before had been an expanse of grass, gradually grew into a meadow filled with poppies and thistle.

* * *

Astia's body shivered under the touch of brass and flesh.

"Do you wish me to stop?" Sil's lips brushed her ear, dual tone seeping into her skin, shivers following in its wake.

"No, don't stop." she whispered, "Sil…"

"I enjoy hearing you say my name." He lowered his voice to a whisper laced with metallic undertones. "It makes me want to verify how many ways are there for you to say it."

He spoke no more, his mouth following his hands, sparks of magicka falling from his lips instead. Astia tensed and then relaxed as she tangled her fingers in his hair, nails scraping his scalp as he continued.

His name left her lips in a sigh and for a brief moment she could feel him smile against her skin. It was almost too much to feel at once, hands, mouth and hair sliding over her feverish skin. Her body shivered, whispered and sang under Sil's touch, as though it were one of the mechanisms of his creation, succumbing to his will, reduced to experiencing, feeling.

Astia's fingers twitched involuntarily as Sil's hair slipped from her grasp, following the electric path left by his fingers and mouth, amplifying pleasure to almost unbearable heights. She frantically grasped the sheets, no longer in control of her own voice as the coarse locks slid over her abdomen, the sparks of magicka now driven into her in deliberate strokes until she could think no more, sighing, whispering and screaming his name.

She struggled to catch her breath as he crawled back up her body.

"Do you wish me to stop?" Sil asked, his artificial hand cool against her flushed cheek.

Astia shook her head, unsure she'd be able to speak.

"I want to be inside you again. Will you let me?"

Astia nodded, still not trusting her voice, trying to grab a hold of his shoulders and failing. Her body felt weightless, as if melting and solidifying once more as they joined, maddeningly slow. Sil rose above her, brass hand supporting his weight, his hair covering them both in a shade of silver, eyes not leaving hers until it seemed as though all colours in the world were reduced to red. It was becoming difficult for her to keep any coherence to her thoughts, but Astia thought she wouldn't mind. She wouldn't mind if this was the only colour she could ever see, as long as she could continue feeling this, the bond, connection, belonging.

"I can hear your thoughts." The metallic undertones of Sil's voice washed over her skin like a wave. "Is that what you wish me to say?"

Astia nodded and suddenly she could feel all his weight on her and welcomed it, his face right over hers, flooding her in red once more.

"You belong to me." he said against her lips, pushing the words into her with their joined breaths. Astia's body spasmed in response and then she whispered his name back to him, countless times until she felt him shiver and still, his skin slick on hers as he rolled them over, holding her close to the unchanged rhythm of his artificial heart.

* * *

They floated in the air under the dark expanse of the night sky strewn with pale lights, under cold, desolate faces of Masser and Secunda coloured by the northern lights, their combined beauty seeping into Astia's skin, down to muscle and bone.

It didn't feel as though they were suspended in air; Sil's magicka that held them up gave an impression of a soft pillow upon which they lay as close to each other as possible, bodies entwined.

"I want this to be my last memory of you." said Astia.

She knew their time together was coming to an end. An owl hooted among the pines, the only sound as her words filled the space between Sil and her, his arms still wrapped tight around her. His hair underneath her cheek rose and fell with Astia's every breath, minuscule, electric touches to her over sensitized skin.

"I understand." His voice was quiet to the point when the metallic undertones were barely audible. "As you wish."

Astia leaned back and gently took his face in her hands.

"I know you could read it in my mind, but I want to say it aloud, only once. I am selfish this way." her thumbs caressed high cheekbones in the dark, gaunt face. "I love you, Sil."

Moonlight lit countless sparks in Sil's eyes as he looked back at her, the owl's cry echoing again in the distance. In the silence that now covered both of them, Astia could hear the song of crickets, and the rustling of leaves as some large creature was moving through the night forest.

"You are anything but selfish, Astia." Sil said.

"If I were as selfless as you think me to be, it wouldn't be so hard to part from you." Astia smiled faintly.

She looked at him, her eyes watering as she refused to blink, committing to memory the way night painted shadows beneath his cheekbones with inky black, the silvery sheen of hair framing his face in a stark contrast to his dark skin, his thin lips set in a frown.

"I will miss you." she said and hid her face in the crook of his neck, refusing to look anymore so he wouldn't see her tears.

His arms tightened their hold around her as she drifted off.

When she fell asleep, Sotha Sil let his magic lower them on the ground and carried her into the house. He set her down on the bed and pulled the furs over her. Firelight bathed Astia's face in a warm glow, softening her delicate features. He watched her in silence and then lay down next to her, his movements slow and careful so he wouldn't wake her.

"I wish that fate treats you with kindness." he said quietly, "I know no one more deserving of happiness. I wish…"

He failed to notice the moment when he reached towards Astia's face, without thinking, as if guided by the will of another. He stopped the movement, and his hand fell limp on the coarse fur.

"It matters not. My selfishness is of no importance."

He lay close enough to feel her breath tickle his skin, but didn't touch her, motionless, until darkness gave way to dawn, the first rays of the sun stirring the minuscule specs of dust into an unhurried dance among wooden beams and carvings.

Astia stirred in her sleep, a small sigh leaving her lips. She opened her eyes, squinting in the morning light, her heart heavy. She didn't have to look around to know she was alone.


	13. Chapter 13

**Be Still**

Astia shivered in Bruma's wind despite the warmth of the furs wrapped around her. Bone croaked unhappily, roused from his inert state as he perched on her shoulder. She patted the brass bird's head to calm it down. Ever since she woke up alone in her Eastmarch home, Bone no longer spoke in Sotha Sil's voice. She understood it was better this way, but couldn't help but miss both the dual tone and the unusual, long and complex sentences that the sorcerer chose to express his opinions.

It was with great sadness that she understood that Bruma was no longer her home; though still prominent in her childhood memories, it was now a place of death and sorrow, not happiness. Her home now was elsewhere, anchored in unchanging whirring of a mechanical heart.

"Be safe," she whispered into the emptiness of the snowy plains, their vastness cut through by the majestic mountains. "Be safe, wherever you are."

The Jeralls had always calmed Astia, but at this moment, as she watched their jagged peaks framed in the paleness of the cold, morning sky, she couldn't shake an uneasy feeling she had no explanation for.

There was a knock on the door of her chamber.

"Enter." Astia said. She did not turn around as the door creaked and footsteps sounded closer.

"It is time, my lady." said a voice behind her. "Are you ready?"

"Yes." Although her tone did not express it, the vestige couldn't supress a sudden, unpleasant shiver.

She lingered for a few moments after the messenger left.

"I don't know, Sil." She whispered, shaking her head as she realized yet again how pathetic it was of her to keep talking to one who would no longer listen. "I don't know if I am."

Her eyes swept over the dark peaks for the last time and she supressed a sigh when she turned to leave the chamber.

"It matters not." she said, unwittingly slipping into Sotha Sil's speaking pattern. "I stand here because I have to."

* * *

"You have not visited for a long time, my lord Seht." The old Astronomer bowed and Sotha Sil nodded in response as he passed the old mer by.

He walked through empty halls, almost seeing the vestige's shimmering silhouette ahead, knowing she'd walked through his memories when the stars fell off their orbits. Thanks to her, they were all back in their place. He frowned; the disappointment so clear on her face that day causing an unpleasant stir in his thoughts even after so many months. He continued to the first floor of the Planisphere, to one of the workshops he'd used many times before.

He sat down by a long desk and wasted no time; he arrived only to complete a task and return to more pressing matters. He held up his right hand, palm facing his temples. For a short time, his eyes took on an unusual shade of blue and small spheres of shimmering light started forming in the air. Memories he made into stars worked with a mind of their own, showing both him and whomever he was with when the memory had formed, an unexpected side effect of the otherwise impeccable spell that he'd always considered too insignificant to eliminate.

Sotha Sil flicked his wrist and the newly formed stars swirled in the middle of the chamber, pausing in front of him every now and then to display their content before he assigned them their place in the Planisphere.

" _Lie down. You need rest, my lord."_

 _"I can go without sleep for much longer than a regular mortal, Astia Varo. It is fine."_

 _"No. As you pointed out yourself, my lord, you are not a god."_

For a brief moment, there was a small smile on the sorcerer's face, but then he shook his head.

"X-567-I.5" he said calmly, and the star floated away, bouncing in the air on the way to its new home.

 _"How long has it been since anybody touched you?"_

" _Oh by Mara's grace… you don't remember, do you?"_

 _"My deepest apologies, my lord. I didn't mean to disrespect you so."_

 _"It is a sad world where compassion is considered disrespect, Astia Varo. You did not disrespect me."_

"X-567-I.6."

" _There was no information I could give them. Nor did they want any. They merely enjoyed inflicting as much pain as they could without killing me, honing their skills, getting better and better at hurting me as they went, before Mannimarco tore my soul out."_

" _All these scars, Astia Varo… Any good healer could have removed them."_

" _You were ashamed. You didn't want anybody to see, to look at you and touch you, as the scars make you feel dirty. Humiliated. Damaged."_

" _I need neither to look, nor touch."_

"X-567-I.7."

" _Before you leave, I need to know what it is that you want for yourself."_

" _It's you, Sil. You are what I want for myself."_

" _I know I cannot have you. I know I must seem foolish. I probably am."_

"X-567-I.8."

" _I wish you were mine."_

" _Even though inadequate, I am. As much as I can be."_

" _I want all of you."_

"X… X-567-I.9." Sotha Sil's voice wavered, hesitation crawling in and forcing its way between sounds that made up words, slithering, carrying a weight of a stutter that had never been there.

" _I know you could read it in my mind, but I want to say it aloud, only once. I am selfish this way."_

" _I love you, Sil."_

"X-567-I.10" he said, but then remained silent, looking at his own face in the memory; his head bowed as though the brass helmet suddenly became too heavy.

"X-567-I.10, repeat." he said, but didn't look again, only listened.

" _I love you, Sil."_ Repeated the newborn star obediently. The sorcerer raised his head and reached out towards the memory of Astia, his restored hand passing through her face.

A factotum passed by a nearby corridor, its brass face blank, mechanical joints whirring in unstoppable movement with no choice or thought but the will of its creator.

"What have I become, my friend?" Sotha Sil looked up, as if his gaze could reach through the vaulted ceiling of the Planisphere, through the celestiodrome to the ever-changing sky above Tamriel.

He rose from the tall chair, eyes pensive as he looked down the now empty corridor before he spoke.

"X-567-I.5, X-567-I.6, X-567-I.7, X-567-I.8, X-567-I.9, X-567-I.10, reabsorb."

The stars rushed towards him, lighting his eyes with unnatural brightness of blue once more as they made contact with him and dissipated.

* * *

The hour has grown late, and the halls of the infirmary in Bruma castle were empty and quiet, save for several guards and a sleepy, tired healer doing her rounds. Cheenal felt exhausted beyond measure and even the old bunk bed in the sleeping quarters seemed a beautiful, unattainable dream at the moment.

"This war has dried my scales enough." she grumbled unhappily, entering the chamber hosting the last charge she was meant to check on that night.

Most wounded were placed in common quarters but not this one, favoured by the Pact forces commander Holgunn, by king Jorunn and by emperor Varen Aquilarios himself. The vestige, as she was called, had her own chamber in which she could recover, but if the stories about entering Coldharbour and defeating Molag Bal were true, Cheenal thought she deserved it.

Cyrodiil had almost been freed of daedra, following a careful truce between the three alliances, and no one worked harder to achieve that goal than the vestige, now bedridden and recovering from a deep wound infected with a poison from Oblivion.

From the gossip that Cheenal had heard, the vestige got hurt when clearing out one of the last remnants of the Worm Cultists north of Bruma, deep in the Jerall Mountains. One of the soldiers said the vestige fought her way through the complex, unstoppable until she reached the main chamber. He swore that the woman froze as soon as she entered and though her guard was down only for a brief moment, it was enough for a cultist to stab her.

The blade was likely aimed at her carotid artery, but instead plunged into her shoulder, below the clavicle. The only reason why she was alive was the bizarre, mechanical bird that always accompanied her. According to the soldier, the creature swooped down, metal talons digging into the face of the vestige's attacker, gouging his eyes, its beak mimicking the movement of a knife from seconds before, unerring as it tore through the man's neck. The cultist choked on his blood, guttural sounds tearing out of his throat in last, desperate attempt at drawing breath, but the vestige didn't hear it. Her body convulsed on the ground, hand reaching blindly towards her avian companion as she frantically whispered words no one around her understood, until she lost consciousness.

Cheenal wasn't sure if the rumours were true, but she sighed heavily as she prepared a new portion of poultices behind a large divider in the vestiges chamber. She loved her calling as a healer and it pained her that she couldn't erase the vestige's pain immediately – oblivion damage was difficult and tricky to heal, and although the woman's life was in no danger, a large portion of healing had to be natural to avoid any lasting damage, not rushed by magicka that the healer possessed. Sadly, it meant quite a bit of pain.

"I intensely dislike leaving my research behind, but you getting hurt displeases me even more." The words spoken suddenly in the silence of the chamber almost made Cheenal jump. It was a voice like no other she'd ever heard – it sounded like voices of two men speaking at once, though one of them had a strange, metallic tone to it.

Trying to be as quiet as possible, Cheenal placed her hand on a hilt of a dagger at her belt and took several careful, measured steps to peer from behind the divider. As soon as she saw the stranger, she felt she couldn't move; his presence was overwhelming and it looked as though the air around him was pulsing with raw magicka, yet it didn't scare her.

She had no idea how he got in, as she heard no footsteps before he spoke. It was as though he wasn't there and the next moment materialised out of thin air. He stood by the vestige's bed, taller than anybody that the argonian healer had ever seen, too tall for a dunmer that he seemed to be. He was dressed in a plain, white tunic, long hair of the same colour flowing from underneath a helmet that covered a significant portion of his face.

The stranger sat down on the vestige's bed, his height still making him tower over the sleeping woman, and placed his hands over her shoulder. With a start, Cheenal noticed that one of his hands looked like it was carved out of some metal, but she discarded the thought as soon as both of the stranger's palms started emitting a warm, orange glow. The vestige stilled, her breaths more rhythmical and deeper, and Cheenal breathed a quiet sigh of relief – the stranger was a fellow healer and whatever he was doing seemed to be helping.

The strange dunmeri healer cupped the vestige's face gently with his other hand – this one looked perfectly normal. He held his palm in place for a long moment. He took hold of the amulet that the woman never seemed to take off and whispered something, too quiet for Cheenal to hear. It glowed in response for several seconds. He then took the vestige's hand in his and gazed down at her for a long time, unmoving, so when he finally spoke, the healer almost jumped again.

"Your absence is felt." he said. "An important equation finds no solution. A gear here moves out of its usual rhythm, a spring there unwinds when it is not supposed to. A dynamo core whirrs too loud, then ceases its function. Small things, though they have an effect; not on the City, but on its creator."

The words the stranger spoke made no sense, but his voice carried an amount of sadness that moved the healer's heart.

"This ambience suits you." he continued, "The changing skies, the colours in the leaves, the softness of linen and silk. No amount of calculation will change that, even in the face of my growing dilemma."

"Be safe till next I see you, Astia." he added, and then looked straight at Cheenal who felt terribly small all of a sudden, having this strange, powerful presence directed at her.

"Healer." said the stranger, "Come morning, you will find yourself elated, but confused as to the nature of the vestige's recovery. You will consider it a by-product of her unusually strong constitution, as well as the effects of being parted, and then rejoined with her soul."

Cheenal nodded, unable to speak.

"Good." the tall dunmer nodded back. "Now, forget."

* * *

Come morning, Cheenal woke up in a chair by the vestige's bed, stretching her stiff limbs and grumbling at her own stupidity that made her fall asleep by her patient's bed instead of the healers' quarters. Out of habit she checked the vestige's pulse. It seemed much more regular than the day before, and the healer quickly inspected the wound in her charge's shoulder. Then she checked again.

"You are tougher than anyone I have ever seen, vestige." she said quietly, and then walked towards the window, closed her eyes and turned her scaled face towards the morning sun.

"It's going to be a good day." she said.


End file.
